


i'm pulling down stars just to make you glow

by livhasnolife



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, M/M, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, and i don't regret it, connor and evan have a whole Other Thing going on but we don't go too in depth on it, plantgirl!alana, spacegirl!zoe, zoe is pan but we don't go too in depth on it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-02
Updated: 2018-02-02
Packaged: 2019-03-12 14:09:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13548978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livhasnolife/pseuds/livhasnolife
Summary: Zoe Murphy is everywhere and nowhere.The Murphys' house is stuck somewhere in time. Life is frozen. Nothing ever changes. Zoe continues to follow the script that seems to have been written for them, the same thing they've been following for years. Played out in so many different settings: The stuffy green dining room, the lifeless living room, the hallway outside of Connor's lockless door.Life is frozen, and then suddenly, it isn't. It isn't because there's Alana, a whirlwind ofchange change change, in libraries and orchards and oceans and a crowded hallway of two people.Zoe Murphy is everywhere and nowhere simultaneously and one of those somewheres happen to be Alana's heart.Or: Zoe gets wrapped up in tutoring she doesn't need in the first place, Alana's favorite band is the Earth, Connor and Zoe watchThe Office, and they all get a bit lost along the way but things end up okay in the end.





	i'm pulling down stars just to make you glow

**Author's Note:**

> tw: suicide mentions  
> stay safe guys

Zoe feels like she's never anywhere. 

It's weird, because if she's being honest, she's probably too many places at once. She does everything she can to distract herself - she goes to the coffee shop down the road from the school every day on her way home, she goes to school early to practice jazz band (it's not required practice, just her practicing the guitar, but Zoe doesn't have anything better to do. She never does), she has rehearsals after school. She says hi to Nancy and Helen and the Hariss' when she walks down the street her house is on, because driving is too fast. Driving is too much because her knuckles go white and the road goes blurry and she can't focus on her music.

So she walks instead, her feet an unheard tempo to the rhythms in her head. She lets Connor take the car home.

Zoe is everywhere, but she never feels like she's really there. She's never loud enough, big enough, bright enough - she feels so alone in this school full of shiny, broad people. In this world of shiny broad people. So she goes and goes and goes. She laughs a little louder, practices her pieces every day (no one else does, everyone else in jazz band only needs to practice every other day yet she never catches up to them), she gives everything she has, sweat and blood and tears, to play rehearsal. Because God, Zoe doesn't know where she stands. She just wants to be somewhere sometime.

People stopped genuinely being Zoe's friend when high school started. Her brother ruined that for her, and she hated him for it. She wanted to punch him when on her first day one of the teachers had called for roll call, "Zoe... Murphy," she, of course, being there, said "here!" and was met with, "I've got my eye on you, Murphy. Troublemakers, you Murphys are," and she had ducked her head in shame at the feeling of eyes burning themselves into her neck and memory.

By the middle of Freshmen year though, Zoe had built a name for herself. She reworked everything from the ground up. The teachers didn't hate her as soon as her grades started to soar. She had a table of friends, and she was great at jazz band for her age, and she was annoying and loud and exactly what someone would expect a freshman to be. She was a kid because she was allowed to be, for a while. 

Connor didn't talk to her at school. Connor didn't really talk to her ever though. When Zoe was a freshman, she didn't notice the weed or the yelling or her friends hanging out without her behind her back.

Sophomore year was worse. That's when she actually started becoming aware of her surroundings. Zoe realized that year she was, and is, about as insignificant as a speck of dust. She starts cleaning up Connor's messes, because of course she does.

Connor was-- is a fucking asshole but she's still the Responsible One. She has to take care of him. She's still his sister no matter how much he denies it. No matter how many times he looks at her with this burning anger in his eyes. No matter how many times he tells her he's going to kill her.

Junior year isn't any better.

-

Zoe finds Alana Beck for the first time in the library, tears stinging her eyes, because sure, she knows she doesn't ever have close friends, just _friends_. The lowest grade of friends. The dollar store version of friends, essentially. But that doesn't make it hurt any less when she's met with Katy C. looking at her sadly when she approaches the table and explaining that, "There's no room today at the table, Zoe. I'm sorry."

It's the same look her mom gives her all the time. Wreaking of pity and unappreciated. Zoe nods vigorously, because of course there's no room, why would there be room for her? She would've been a waste of that seat anyway. She insists to Katy C. that it's fine, and she seems satisfied, giving Zoe a sad little wave when she leaves the lunch room. Zoe doesn't wave back.

Instead, Zoe runs to the library, and hides in the quietest corner she could find, knees to her chest. She squeezes her eyes shut and counts backwards from ten by two's. Ten, eight, six, four, two, zero, repeat. It's always helped her calm down for some reason - something consistent despite everything. Numbers always make sense. Zoe can do numbers.

"Um, excuse me."

Zoe gives a muffled, too-high pitched, "One second!" Here she is, in the middle of a library, having a break down. She uncomfortably unfurls herself, scooting to the side a bit. She rubs her face until she's sure it's redder than usual.

There's a girl standing above her, looking concerned, with one of the most beautiful pair of eyes she has ever seen. 

"I just needed a textbook from behind you but. Are you okay?" she asks. Her voice is so steady.

"Uh, yeah, sorry," Zoe says, trying to lift herself up but her knees are so wobbly she just ends up letting herself fall back onto the floor. She sighs, scrubbing her eyes once again furiously to fight off the onslaught of oncoming of tears. She doesn't like crying in front of anyone, especially strangers. "No," she admits, defeated.

"Here, let me help." the girl says in a determined voice, holding out a hand. Zoe takes it and finally makes it to a standing position with the help of someone propelling her forward. The girl lets go. "Do you want to talk about it?" 

"I mean, not really." Zoe laughs hollowly, in the way all of her family seems to do amazingly. Their one true shared skill. "My friends are jerks."

The other teenager looks saddened by this, and says, with a sort of genuine tone that can be hard to find in high school, "I'm sorry. I've been through that. You'd be surprised how many people I've met who are jerks."

Zoe finds herself smiling, because this girl in front of her with too-perfect posture and precisely placed glasses is, honestly, a bit odd, but she likes her. She feels like she's fallen into some sort of orbit. She's drawn to her.

"I'm Alana Beck, by the way. Student council representative, vice president of the GSA, coach of the science bowl, honorary BPA member--"

The list goes on for quite some time before Alana finally finishes. She doesn't pause to take a breath the whole time. It's both incredible and slightly scary. She takes Alana's outstretched arm anyway.

"Zoe Murphy."

"Like Connor Murphy?" Alana recognizes and Zoe's stomach fills with dread because _no, no not like Connor Murphy never like Connor Murphy please don't compare me to him I'm not him_ but she just gives a tiny dejected nod, focuses on the floor, because of course Alana knows her brother. She accepts that Alana will never speak to her again after that reveal.

"He's actually one of my closest acquaintances, we've been partners during English a few times. He's.. funny."

Zoe quirks an eyebrow, "I guess that's one way to describe him."

Alana nods, stiffly, motivatedly, "He's really intimidating, but I like him. I don't know."

"He's never mentioned you," she says, then immediately regrets when Alana physically wilts. Smile fallen off her face, shoulders shrunken in. "But we don't talk anyway! I don't know any of his friends."

"Acquaintances," she corrects, meeting Zoe's eyes, a sad upturn of her lips resting on her face.

Zoe just says, "I'm sorry," because she is. She blew it. She hands Alana the textbook she wanted. Then the bell rings, and she takes off. 

-

The place where Zoe never really is, funnily enough, is her own home. She comes home before curfew every day, sure, but she spends that time cooped up in her room, headphones in and world out. She doesn't hear Connor in the room down the hall, she doesn't hear her parents' shouting across from her, all she hears is smooth vocals and soft vibes. "Hipster shit" is what Connor calls it. Zoe hates that.

She takes as long as possible to get home everyday- choosing the roundabout way. She avoids going home at all through unnecessary time put into extra credit work that she doesn't need. Zoe never stops, but somehow she feels frozen in place. It's always the same at the end of the day. One way or another she ends up bitter and crying in her bed. 

Zoe's house isn't a home. Zoe's house feels like it's trapped in time because nothing ever changes. It's stuck. She's stuck.

She avoids social media like the plague because every time she goes on she sees her friends talking about their friends talking about their friends and so on. Zoe has the lowest level of friends. She can't remember the last time she hung out with anyone outside of obligation.

That's another one of the only consistent things Zoe has. No one. She will always have no one. She's gotten used to that.

-

It's a Tuesday the next time Zoe actually speaks to Alana Beck.

It's an accident. She's headed to her next class in a hurry because she hadn't heard the bell when she collides with a shoulder and suddenly she's on the floor.

It's a mess. Papers scattered everywhere, her knee bent under herself at an awkward and, quite frankly, painful way, while students are still rushing through the halls around them.

Alana speaks quickly, like always, "Oh, Zoe! Let me help." She pushes through the crowd to collect every stray paper and hands them all to Zoe in an organized manner.

"Thank you so much, I'm so sorry I bumped into you," Zoe says, already up and heading to her next class before stopping in her tracks when Alana calls surely, 'wait.'

"I couldn't help but notice the grade on your English test, the D?" she says, wringing her hands together. Not in a nervous way. "I don't mean to intrude, but if you're struggling with that subject, I'm a tutor for underclassmen. You're a junior, right? I could help you."

Zoe feels frozen. She doesn't say that test was from a month ago, she doesn't say that the only reason it was so bad was because she was absent the day before, she doesn't say that her teacher let her retake it, she doesn't say that Alana shouldn't be looking at her grades in the first place. Instead, she does nothing because suddenly she's in her bedroom and she's so alone and nothing ever changes. 

Alana takes her silence for shock. "It'd be no trouble, I have lots of extra time on my plate at the moment since the science bowl is over," Zoe nods numbly in understanding- she knew the science bowl was over from one of her jazz band friends.

She doesn't realize that the nod was misconstrued by Alana until she speaks up again, this overly enthusiastic tone, "Great! I'm free this Friday, if you'd like to come over after school?" Zoe Does Not need Alana's help. Zoe Does Not want Alana's help, but again, Alana is moving too fast for her and saying, "I'm going to be late for class. Let me know, though, okay?" then rushing down the hallway. 

Zoe stands there, unsteady and unsure. The late bell rings.

It's her first tardy of the year.

-

Zoe thinks her least favorite noise in the world is knives scraping against plates.

It doesn't really bother her when people are talking over it, or she's doing something else while it's going on, but her family spends every dinner in heavy silence. The only sound being the clinking of forks and the scrape of knives against plates. Zoe wants to grab her father's hands to stop him, because he always does it the most aggressively. She restrains herself, but it's a near thing.

Her mom clears her throat, cutting through the unpleasant noise, and says, "How was your day, Zoe?"

"Fine," Every day the answer is the same. Every day is the same.

"That's great, sweetie," her mom says with sad eyes and a smiling face. These are their lines. The same lines they've rehearsed every day for the past 3 years. "How was yours, Connor?" she asks then, pointing all her attention onto her son.

He just avoids her eyes, continues to not touch his food.

"Answer your mother, Connor," Her father speaks then, grumbling and stern. Zoe has no lines yet. Her cue hasn't been uttered.

"It was fine," he mumbles, lackluster, like he'd rather be anywhere but here. Zoe understands. She does anything she can to avoid this dinner table. This stupid green kitchen. She hates the stupid uncomfortable wooden chairs. 

"That's good, honey."

The silence resumes and overtakes the room for a few more minutes.

"Zoe, Angela's mother said you got a tardy today, is that true?" 

Zoe's honestly kind of shocked that Angela would tell on her for a tardy of all things, considering there was a rumor last year that Angela was caught smoking weed behind the school and Zoe never said a word. She barely even _knows_ Angela, it's just because their moms are friends and she's in her math class that she was late for today.

"Yeah. I didn't hear the bell. Sorry, mom," she half-truths.

"It's fine sweetie. Just make sure it doesn't happen again, okay?" 

"Okay," Zoe picks at her gluten-free pizza disinterestedly.

"This is bullshit," Connor mutters, fists gripping his chair from beneath the table.

"What did you just say, young man?" Larry fumes.

"I said, this is bullshit! Zoe gets a tardy, and all you guys say is 'oh, just make sure it doesn't happen again', but if I get a tardy, you guys scream at me!" he protests.

The chair makes a screeching noise when Zoe gets up and hastily makes her way toward the stairs. She doesn't hear his next sentence. She'd usually feel an obligation to stay and stand up for herself, but she's too tired today. She breaks the routine. She can't fight a losing battle every day.

-

Alana finds her in the morning the next day to make sure they're still on for Friday. 

Zoe is so tired. She can't deal with this, so she simply excuses, "I have to check to make sure I'm free," It's not a lie.

Zoe skips practicing her guitar solo that day - "I'm sorry, Ms. Poulain, I just feel really sick today, can I just come in for an extra practice Friday morning to make up for it please? Thank you," - and goes straight to her house. She falls asleep doing her homework at 4, and doesn't wake up until it's dinner time at 8. She skips dinner to finish her homework and immediately falls asleep again. Zoe is so tired.

Her routine is in such a bad state that she thinks if she listened hard enough she could hear it crying out in agony.

-

When Alana checks on Zoe during lunch the next day to ask if she's free, Zoe panics and says yes. She's officially caught in a web of lies at this point.

But it's almost worth it, because Alana grins an actual real grin and her eyes light up and she nods and says, "Okay!" in such a bright way it'd make the school's choir director wince. Some tiny part of Zoe, deep, deep down let's herself hope for a higher grade of friend. A real friend.

-

Friday morning, Zoe practices on her guitar. She means to focus on her solo, she really does, but something takes over her. She starts by looking at her sheet music. Everything feels so fuzzy that day, nothing makes sense. Her solo is suddenly a bunch of dots on 4 lines and she doesn't know what any of them mean. From top to bottom, ECAF. Those are the spaces between the lines, but none of it's sinking in. Not even music makes sense anymore. Nothing seems to.

Zoe plucks the E string pathetically, but it's a start. The music comes back to her, and her playing is stilted and unfeeling, but at least it's something. When there's 10 minutes until the bell rings, Zoe puts her guitar in the storage room. Ms. Poulain sympathetically nods her a goodbye. 

It's not the best start to the day, but it could've been worse. There's a stinging underneath Zoe's skin nonetheless.

The rest of the day, Zoe's dissociative-ness only seems to get worse. She thanks the universe for the fact she doesn't have anything big going on in any of her classes that she can instead do for homework over the weekend when reality finally comes back. She wanders through school without feeling like she's even there. Is she even really there?

Alana finds her when she's on her way to jazz band after school. She feels a tap on her shoulder, and she turns a little, and there's Alana, apprehensive looking.

"Hello. So, I'm busy up until 5:30, but after that time you can come to my house any time you like," she says.

Zoe only smiles, "I'll be there," She's committed herself to this, she might as well make the best of it.

Alana's eyes crinkle at the edges a bit. It reminds her of her mom's sparkly red and green tissue paper she uses for Christmas decorations. Zoe thinks, again, for the millionth time, that Alana has such pretty eyes. She'll think it a million more before this tutoring thing is through, she's sure.

-

Zoe arrives at the Becks' household at 6 o' clock. She has her backpack with her, because she isn't quite sure what she needs to bring, so she just brings everything.

Her parents were surprised she was leaving, which didn't make her feel any better about being basically invisible but also Not Really Invisible. Zoe's always hated limbo. She just wants a yes or no, but still, she gets no answer on whether she's real and material or a ghost.

She knocks on the door twice before it swings open, there standing an older woman who looks similar to Alana but rapidly different simultaneously.

"Oh, hello! You must be Alana's friend, I'm her mother," she says, smiling wide and encouragingly. Not timid like her own mother, but smiling with her all. Mrs. Beck is not broken. That's something foreign to Zoe.

"Hi, Mrs. Beck, it's very nice to meet you. My name's Zoe," she says, shaking Alana's mom's hand.

"It's a pleasure to have you with us, Zoe. 'Lana should be upstairs. I think she's playing her clarinet at the moment, but if you knock, she'll be right and ready to talk to you, I'm sure," Zoe nods, digesting this. She didn't know Alana played clarinet. She didn't - and doesn't - know a lot of things about Alana. She wouldn't mind getting to know her better.

Mrs. Beck leads her to the stairs, and then from there, she's on her own. First door to the left. She can't miss it.

Luckily enough, she doesn't miss it. The door has Alana printed onto it, in big, black helvetica. There's a few flowers on the door too, but Zoe pays them little mind. She can hear clarinet from where she is outside the door. She feels bad stopping such a certain sound, but she knocks after a few seconds of listening anyway.

The music stops abruptly, calculatedly. "Come in!" 

Zoe tentatively pushes the door open.

"Oh, hey there, Zoe," Alana greets, already taking apart the black instrument she was just playing on. "Sorry about the music. My parents like it, so I keep up with it at least once a week."

"It's fine, I think it's sweet," she means this.

Alana just gives her a tight-lipped smile and pats a patch of the bed next to her. Zoe takes the invitation to sit.

Alana's room is almost exactly as Zoe expected. Clean and organized. It's mostly monochrome, but there's the occasional splash of color here and there in the form of a painting on the wall or a little cactus on her window sill in one of those cups-so-big-they're-not-even-cups-anymore. A bowl with a handle, really. Zoe finds it stupidly endearing. She points a glance also in the direction of the little rainbow flag on the wall, but quickly moves her line of vision away.

"Are you ready to begin?" Alana asks, bringing Zoe back from her examination.

"Um, yeah, of course," Zoe nods, "just.. how exactly does this work?"

Alana looks confused, "what do you mean?"

"I've never been tutored before, so, I was just wondering what we're really going over," she explains as best she can. Alana seems to understand.

"Oh, yes. We can just go over what you seemed to miss on your test last time. If that's alright, I mean."

It is alright, because Zoe brought the test. However, this whole situation is not quite alright. Zoe doesn't need tutoring. Zoe doesn't need Alana's help. And yet, Zoe doesn't want to leave.

They study and go over things Zoe already knows for about an hour before they both grow visibly exhausted of the symbolism and the active and passive voice. Or, at least, Zoe grows visibly exhausted while Alana keeps on plowing through. Alana never seems to run out of steam. She's all go and go and go. 

When Alana realizes Zoe has been staring at the same patch of her bedroom carpet for five minutes straight, she stops in her tracks. Her mind looks a little like it's working in reverse. She asks, "Do you need to take a break?"

Zoe pulls her eyes away from gray carpet. She looks surprised by the question, but nods anyway, "Yes, please. Sorry, focusing too much on one subject hurts my head, you know?"

"I do not, but I can imagine and sympathize so we should take a small rest. I understand," Alana tells the truth.

Zoe admires Alana's honesty. Wishes she had some herself in this situation. "Since we're going to be around each other a lot, don't you think we should get to know each other a bit better?"

Alana blinks, "I suppose you're right, actually. That's a great idea, Zoe." she smiles, tightening her already perfect ponytail. 

"Okay. How about every time we do one of these sessions, we can take a break at some point for me to rest my head and we each ask each other three questions?" 

Alana nods. "I'll go first this time."

Zoe grins. "Okay."

"Okay." Alana agrees. "Let me think."

A few ticks of Alana's clock pass.

"What's you favorite word?" she asks, lightly. 

Zoe smiles, "English themed. Nice. I like effervescent. It's just so.. Pleasing to say."

"Effervescent." Alana tries out, light in her eyes, "I agree. It's satisfying, also a good word choice."

"Thank you very much."

"Of course." and then, "Do you like the ocean?" 

"Yes! It's beautiful. It's so unpredictable and peaceful and so much of everything at once. It's kind of amazing. I'm happy to have been born on a water planet."

Alana's face scrunches a bit, "I don't really understand what you mean about that whole water planet thing. Elaborate?"

Zoe swings her feet off the bed, "Well, it's stupid, but I mean, technically I could be an alien and born on another planet. Out of all the alternate universes, I'm sure there's at least one where I'm an alien on a planet where water doesn't even exist. Yet, I'm here. I feel incredibly lucky."

Alana hums contemplatively. "You're interesting, Zoe Murphy."

"Thank you, Alana Beck." a toothy grin, "My turn," Zoe stops her legs orbit to pull them back up to her. 

"But that was only two?" Alana tilts her head.

"You asked me to elaborate."

"That's hardly fair--"

"What's your favorite color?" Zoe scoots a bit closer. Alana doesn't make a move to stop her.

"Magenta," it slides off her tongue easily, like she thinks about it a lot.

"Mine's indigo." Zoe states. "We're on opposite sides of the color spectrum, I suppose."

Alana nods.

"Does your plant have a name?"

"Does my plant have a what?"

"A name. You know, like, Alana? What you call something?"

"I know what a name is, I just don't understand."

"A plant's alive too. It deserves an identity, right?"

"I suppose so. I've just never thought about giving it a name before."

"Well, you have now."

"That's very true."

"Stargazing: scary or comforting?"

Alana pushes up her glasses from where they were hanging a little too low off her face. "I've never actually done it."

"What." The world stops spinning. Zoe is in shock.

"I mean, it's always really hard to see the stars here, and I never really leave," She says, simply, like she's not missing out on one of the best things in the world. Zoe makes a wounded noise.

"I need to take you to the orchard one night," she says.

"Orchard?"

"The Autumn Smile Apple Orchard. It's abandoned now, but my family used to go there a lot. Before it shut down the owners gave me and my brother keys to the gate. They moved away after they went bankrupt, but they used to like me and Connor a lot, for some reason. Guess they figured it would do us good to still have a way to get back there." she picks at her nails, "It's been a while since I've been there but the stars are so beautiful and clear out there. You've got to see it one day."

"I think I'd like that."

"I'd love to take you."

Zoe stays for dinner. The Becks love her, somehow, she thinks she'll never be able to understand.

It was a good day, even when she ends up alone in her cold room. 

-

Monday takes too long to reach Zoe, unfortunately. That weekend was one of the roughest she had in a while. Connor probably saw how happy she was on Saturday and decided to make it his personal mission to make her miserable. She was never allowed even one nice thing.

Despite how _nice_ Friday seemed to be for her, life always comes back eventually. She comes back to her family, and school, her not good enough-ness, her not-friends- life and everything that comes with it.

She sees Alana at lunch, surrounded by other people. She figures it's best not to interrupt. Her not-friends have enough room at the table to keep her today.

The day is bad. It happens sometimes.

Like when Zoe is in English. When Zoe is one period away from jazz band practice. Zoe is just 20 minutes away from practice. And yet, Zoe is on the verge of a breakdown.

She raises her hand, gets permission to run to the restroom, and doesn't come back for the rest of the class period. She figures that Mr. Shepherd will understand, since he's always been kind to the students who actually try. 

Her vision is swimming and she just wishes she could make it stop.

When the last bell finally rings, Zoe waits exactly ten minutes before exiting the bathroom stall and the bathroom altogether. She follows her usual route to jazz band rehearsal, sheet music heavy in her hands.

Alana finds her crouched against the wall outside the music room, head against the wall, frizzy hair a halo around her frame, eyes shut tight.

"Hello," She says, looking down from her standing position.

Zoe's eyes open. "Oh," she pauses, "Hi Alana."

"I just wanted to see the next time you were free for tutoring."

Zoe snorts, "I'm always free," she says it like it's the most obvious thing in the world. It isn't.

Alana's eyebrows furrow and her lips pout a little in a way Zoe thinks is really cute. "But?" She gestures to the music room.

"Oh, yeah, I have jazz band until 4 everyday, then play rehearsal until 5:30 every Wednesday. Other than that, I'm never really anywhere. Sometimes I stay after just because, but nothing's necessary."

Alana looks like she really wants to say something but she's biting it back with everything she has. She looks so uncomfortable it physically hurts Zoe to look at.

"Um, I should go inside now, practice is going to start," she says.

"Oh, right. How's Wednesday for you?" 

"Wednesday works."

"6:30?" a push of glasses further up the nose.

"6:30." the tightening of a ponytail.

"Bye, Zoe." steady smile.

"Bye, Alana." Zoe's heart doing some weird 2/4 rhythm.

-

Tuesday and Wednesday go quickly enough. They pass with no glaring snags.

Rehearsal is tough. Zoe is used to that; rehearsal is often exhausting. She's not broad, bright, big enough for it. She can't fill a whole room with her presence, she can't fill a whole auditorium with her voice. Zoe's just so not enough for the theatre.

She drives to Alana's. Her knuckles don't turn white. Zoe is okay, for now.

She makes it to their house alright. Mrs. Beck greets her with her nice, unbroken smile. Zoe tries her best to seem intact. She finds Alana, sitting on her bed, meticulously drawing something geometric from a distance.

Alana seems almost shocked to see Zoe there, in the doorway. "Oh. I lost track of time, I'm sorry."

"It's alright."

She pats a place on the bed for Zoe. It's apart from her. There's a constant distance between them wherever they go. A precise gap. That's okay.

Zoe sits, a few inches away from Alana. Her pen and sketchbook are gone. "What were you doing?"

Alana smiles, "Aren't we doing questions at break?"

Zoe shrugs, "Touché." A small smile plays at her lips. "So, what's on the agenda today, teach?"

"We're devoting the session to punctuation."

There's a groan, and then the lesson is started.

-

Two sheets of example sentences later, Zoe bursts. 

"I can't do this anymore!" she exclaims, falling backwards onto Alana's bed, notebook fallen from her lap.

Alana sighs, "I suppose we have time for a break."

"Thank you," she breathes out, relieved. A whoosh of air that escapes her lungs while she lays. 

There's a small silence, but it's not a bad silence.

"What were you doing when I walked in?"

"I draw shapes to make other shapes when I'm stressed," Alana states.

"You? The amazing Alana Beck? Have stress like the rest of us? Unthinkable."

She gives a breathy laugh. Zoe grins, pulling herself back up to face the other girl.

"What's your favorite word?"

"Tranquility. Original question, by the way," Alana teases, a bit unsurely.

Zoe sticks her tongue out. She thinks for a few moments. "Where's your favorite place you've ever been?"

"My family and I visited the Grand Canyon once. That was really beautiful."

Zoe gapes, "No way! I've always wanted to go there."

Alana snorts, "Way."

"Oh my god, I'm so jealous of you."

"How about you? Favorite place?"

"We went to the Louvre once. It was amazing."

"No way. You've been to the Louvre and you think the Grand Canyon is amazing?"

"Way." Zoe mimics, smiling. "Just because I've been somewhere amazing doesn't mean I don't want to go anywhere else amazing."

"I can understand that."

Zoe just sits there, looking at her, glowing.

"Ever been to the ocean?"

"Yeah, a few times. I really liked it, but we stopped going when I was seven and all of my memories are kind of fuzzy now." a pause, "I'd love to go back."

"Why haven't you?"

"My brother almost drowned when we visited. My family haven't let either of us go by large bodies ever since. Rivers and pools are fine, but no lakes or oceans or– anywhere they can lose sight of us, really," Just one more thing Connor's ruined for her. Alana looks sad.

The room is quiet. Zoe can hear her heartbeat. 

"My family goes every once and a while. I'd take you."

"Really?"

"Really."

-

Zoe really likes girls.

It's not an important detail, usually. Zoe also likes boys. Zoe likes everyone, really. 

But sometimes, it just becomes so apparent how much she likes girls.

Her business class is one of those times. There's a girl who sits across the room from her. A girl who in colors would be the softest orange Zoe had ever seen, like a sunset. A girl with a laugh that ends in snorts. A girl with curves and a button nose, winged eyeliner and an attitude. Zoe objectively likes watching this girl.

Her name's Monika Darling, she thinks. Sometimes Zoe doodles her on the edge of her papers.

-

It's a bad day when Zoe enters Alana's bedroom and plops down to lay on her bed right away. 

After the punctuation day of tutoring, they'd fallen into a pattern of meeting every week on Wednesdays at 6:30 and Fridays at 5:30. It's consistent. It's something tangible; _real_. And it's probably stupid, but having something so there is so grounding for Zoe. And, Alana makes her happy. Alana is her friend, even if it's not reciprocated. 

It's.. messed up. Zoe's using her, because she's her friend, but Alana just sees her as an acquaintance, someone she's tutoring, the tutoring Zoe never needed in the first place she just lies and _lies_ and--

"Are you okay?" Alana says, concerned.

Zoe tries to say 'Do I look okay?' but it comes out as gibberish through a mouthful of black blanket.

"Sorry, what?"

"I said, 'do I look okay'?" Zoe exclaims, rolling over onto her back. 

"You look tired," she tells her, smoothing down her shirt, "but that's not to say you don't look okay. You look nice." she makes no eye contact.

Zoe, at a loss for words. "Thank you. You do, too."

Alana looks anywhere other than Zoe's face. "Why wouldn't you look okay?"

"Today was hard." Zoe grunts. "My brother took possession of the car and locked all the doors so I had to sprint to school, but I still ended up late. I forgot my lunch money in the hurry, so I just ended up not eating lunch today. I had to present my powerpoint today, which wasn't that bad, but I was missing a slide that everyone else had and I know it means I got a lesser grade and it was just kind of embarrassing and just. Bad day, I guess."

"I'm sorry. I get overwhelmed a lot so I really get it. I have a bad days as well, believe it or not."

"Yeah?" 

"Yeah."

Zoe pulls herself up to sit next to Alana. "Can we.. not do tutoring today?"

Zoe swears Alana looks disappointed, Alana looks like she's wilting, for a just a split second. But it's gone by the time she speaks, covered by a thick considerate smile, "Oh! Oh, yes, of course. You can leave, don't feel like you're stuck here--"

"Wait, Alana, I meant like," she stops. "Like, do you want to go somewhere, maybe?"

Alana blinks. Once, twice. "Oh." a real, genuine smile stretches across her face, "I'd love to."

It takes her until they get to the car for her to say anything else.

"Where are we going, by the way?" Alana asks from her place in the passenger seat.

"You'll see."

"That's ominous," Alana acknowledges.

"Ominous is my middle name," Zoe says, nudging Alana's shoulder with her hand before she pulls it back to the wheel.

"Mine's Amaryllis," she deadpans.

"Like the flower?" 

"The very same."

"Determination and beauty, right? Accurate."

Alana laughs, a voice like chimes all in a row. Like one of her jazz band friend Yasmin's marimba. "You're just trying to get out of having another punctuation day. Flattery will get you nowhere, Zoe."

"Damn. My plans were thwarted once again by the amazing Alana Amaryllis Beck." Zoe shines her most dazzling smile.

Alana purses her lips in an almost pout, unknowingly, "See, you now clearly have an unfair advantage. What's your middle name?"

"Becca. And before you say anything, I know. It's the worst," she complains.

"I like it."

"Thanks."

The conversation drowns out as Zoe's "hipster shit" plays.

Alana says she likes her music.

-

"Where are we?" Alana's voice cuts through the noise of Zoe's speakers.

They've pulled up to a black ornate gate capturing the throngs upon throngs of trees. The other girl says nothing, instead, silently climbs out of the car door. Alana follows suit despite the confusion displayed on her face.

Zoe takes the keys from out of her pocket, and makes quick work of the locked gate. She presses on it softly and it slowly swings open.

"Is this--" Alana stops for a second, as if considering, "Is this the orchard?"

Zoe just smiles a knowing smile, walks forward into the gate and into the endless trees. Alana follows, blindly puts all her faith in Zoe. She pins all her hope on Zoe.

She catches up to the girl with a little jog. "Are these apples edible?" she asks, eyes on the trees. Eyes on the pretty fading sky. Eyes on the overgrown orchard.

"Sure are," Zoe answers, plucks one from a low-hanging tree limb in passing. She grabs another from the next tree and throws it in Alana's direction. "Think fast."

Alana does not, in fact, think fast. The apple ends up hitting her chest with a dull _thud_ and falling uselessly to the ground. She bends down to retrieve it. "Do you know what type of apples they are?"

"I haven't the slightest clue," Zoe answers honestly. She continues her trek, her friend trailing behind her.

The orchard is different after a year, or maybe not. Maybe Zoe's different instead. Maybe both are. Zoe used to spend so much time here she became a part of the forest. She created her own home in the orchard and planted her roots, bent and swayed with the wind like the trees, felt the rain soak her hair and clothes, ate wild apples fresh off the branches and spent nights in the limbs of the apple trees. 

Still, she notices the changes. There are big, full, unashamed amethyst purple flowers pushing up through the ground outstretching towards the sky, her feet sink into the mossy grass beneath her more than they used to, the trees are slightly bigger and the sky seems softer.

When they come across a place where there lies a particularly large patch of the flowers, Zoe stops. "They're New England asters," Alana points out, still.

"They're really pretty," Zoe tells her, because it's true. They're so vibrant. 

"The funny thing is, they're not asters at all. They were misclassified, but the name just stuck even after people realized the error. And, you know, the latin root 'aster' means star. So, it makes sense, I suppose," She says it like it's common knowledge. Her eyes are softer than Zoe's ever seen.

"Do they have a meaning?" 

"Patience, elegance, generic one word things," she says in a lull, before continuing, "But also the wish that things could've happened differently."

"Oh?" 

Alana nods. Then the moment is over, her eyes aren't soft, but they aren't hard either. She's back to being who she was. Spine straight, face indifferent. Walls up. Zoe frowns.

They walk in silent companionship until they finally reach their destination. She's almost forgotten the way in all these years, but yet, there she is, Alana Beck at her side. "This is my favorite place in the whole orchard," she says it casually. It feels like there's not enough weight on the words. Like, maybe she should've said, _this is my favorite place in the whole world, and I brought you here._

Alana looks puzzled. "It looks just like the rest of the trees." There's a crinkle between her eyebrows.

Zoe shrugs, "I guess so. But, I don't know, it's different, somehow." a heartbeat, "You see the ivy growing on it?" Alana nods. "None of the other trees really have ivy so prominent like that. And I swear, its apples are the sweetest out of the whole orchard. It's on a hill unlike the others, so you can see the sky really well. And it has the homiest branches-- it feels like you're being held." She makes an abrupt stop, pulls herself backwards away from the tree. "or, well, maybe it is just like all the other trees."

"No. It's special to you, so it's different." A rehearsed and easy smile.

"How long can you stay?" 

"My parents will be fine with whenever as long as I stay in contact with them," she says.

Zoe snorts, "I wish I had that trust with my parents."

Alana looks at her, in that observant way she does, "I'm sorry," she says it like she means it.

"It's okay. It's no one's fault, really," she says, like smoke emerging from her lips. She lets herself become smudges of graphite, black and white, leaning against the tree that she had grown a stronger connection with than her own family. Alana makes the move to stand next to her. 

The sun's already set, but the sky is still barely hanging onto its light. Clouds drift a low outline in the sky, and all they can see are trees for miles. Zoe's reminded of how much she loves this orchard.

She sinks against the base of the tree until she's sitting against it rather than standing. "I used to make plans to run away and live in this orchard," she says, and it's not her cue, but she's so warm. It falls from her lips like tumbling snowflakes, and it's accidental, but you can't just make the cold go away. Zoe knows, she's tried.

"Run away? Really?" Alana says, in this honest, interested manner.

"Yeah. I figured I could live in this tree. It was, like, around a year ago. Things were getting harder, and so, I used to come to this orchard every day and watch the sun set and it made me feel," she takes a deep breath, "safe, I guess. That type of tranquil okay that's hard to come by. I thought I'd love to live here, especially since my family didn't seem to give a shit about me anyway. I could live off the apples." She lets out a little laugh. It feels weird and stiff in her chest.

She knows she's saying too much, she's letting the cold out. But Alana is looking at her, Alana is listening, Alana cares what she has to say, and Alana sees her. She's not a ghost. Zoe is real, so she keeps going, knowing that for once, she's seen and she's heard. "One time, though, I accidentally fell asleep out here. My parents called the police an hour after the sunset, and they found me, and that was the end of my trips to the orchard. I was so pissed at the fact I'd lost my only sanctuary that I packed all of my most important belongings, a gallon of water; anything I figured I needed really. I was about to try and climb out my window when, funnily enough, Connor found me." she knots her hands into her sweatshirt, breathes shakily for a few seconds, "Somehow, he calmed me down and convinced me to stay. A lot's changed in this past year, I guess."

 

Zoe remembers that night really well. She remembers waiting until her parents' light went out under the door, and just to be completely sure it was safe to leave, she remembers waiting to hear her dad's snores. She remembers how the sleek handle of her suitcase felt in her hands, the adrenaline of finally taking her life into her own control, the cold of the air as it hit her face when she opened the window of her room. 

She also remembers the creak of her door opening, the feeling of her knees locking. She remembers how she immediately froze stock still. She remembers the shame of being caught out.

But, then, she also remembers seeing Connor standing there silent. She remembers his eyes darting to her, then the suitcase, then the window, and then to back to her again as he put the pieces together in his mind and analyzed the situation. She remembers watching his brain work, watching when it clicked, seeing him meet her gaze with astonishment. She used to always love whenever she could shock him, get the upper hand somehow. It didn't feel like an upper hand, that time.

She remembers the long strides he took towards her, the grasp of his bony hands as he shut the window. Cynthia always called them piano-playing hands. She had come to her senses as soon as it really seemed to settle that she wasn't going anywhere. At first, she had felt the anger, the liquid fire surge through her veins and she had reached for the window once more but Connor had, very calmly, very gently grabbed her hands and stopped her dead in her tracks. She had whisper-spat venom at him, angry hot tears streaming down her face, poked and prodded and tried to make him yell, make him give her a reason to leave, make him just as angry as she was, but.. he just _wasn't_. He just stood there and waited for her to tire out, and he was there to comfort her when she finally broke down and crumbled to the ground in weight of the situation. That was the last time Connor had hugged her.

 

"I would definitely like to live here." Alana says after a long while. "If the night skies are always this pretty."

Zoe looks up to see the sky as a dark canvas to thousands upon thousands of stars. For a moment, her breath hitches. "I forgot how beautiful it is out here."

"I'd love lay down just to get a better view of the stars but I don't want to get grass stains," Alana tells her, eyes never leaving the sky.

Zoe's struck with realization. "Don't go anywhere," she instructs, "I'll be right back."

A few minutes later, Zoe's climbing back up the hill to the tree with a blanket bundled in her hands. "I always keep one of these in the car just in case," she explains, spreading the blanket out on the ground.

"You go stargazing a lot, I assume?"

Zoe shrugs, "Fairly often, I guess. Not as much as I used to anymore." She lays down on the blanket. Alana hesitantly takes the spot beside her. "What's your favorite planet?"

"Neptune. It's calming," Alana almost-whispers. "What about you?" 

"I like Pluto," Zoe decides.

"That's a dwarf planet. It's also not even on the same orbiting plane as the rest of the planets," Alana says, something light in her voice.

"I know, but I grew attached to it when I was a kid before I knew any of that," she softly conveys. 

"What's your favorite _real_ planet?" Alana questions, biting back a smile.

"Okay, wow, harsh," Zoe laughs, giggles tumbling from her lips like warm honey-lemon tea. The frost is gone from her lungs, if only for a little. "Jupiter is really pretty."

Alana raises an eyebrow in befuddlement, "Jupiter? I didn't see that one coming."

"Honestly, I can understand why you wouldn't. But you need to see the high def pictures of it to really understand how beautiful it is. Did you know that some scientists believe that it shrinks every year?"

Alana turns on her side to face Zoe, to engage more in the conversation, and Zoe wants to face her too but she's worried that'll freak Alana out and close the distance that they've kept for this whole fucked up tutoring thing. Zoe doesn't want to ruin one of the best things she has. "You're kidding."

"Nope." she pops the 'p'.

"I had no idea. It's the biggest planet we have, right? So that's– weird to think about."

Zoe nods in agreement. 

"I really like space," she speaks after a pause.

"I never would have guessed. It's not like you have stars all over your clothes or anything," Alana jokes. Zoe sticks out her tongue childishly.

It really is a beautiful night.

-

Time is weird in the way that it isn't frozen anymore.

They start studying at the orchard every Friday. Zoe's heart is an unsteady beat, like the flutter of a hummingbird's wings. Zoe is so vulnerable under her home tree.

They start eating lunch together in the library and Zoe talks about how she hates the Dewey decimal system and Alana talks about her summer internship as a librarian and her favorite books. They talk about the beauty that is the perks of being a wallflower and graffiti.

Zoe tells Alana that "hey, my English grade is actually an A" but yet, Alana just says, "well, you know, it could still drop again. we can keep going just in case."

Alana doesn't leave.

-

Zoe really likes girls.

It's not an important detail, usually. Zoe also likes boys. Zoe likes everyone, really. 

But sometimes, it just becomes so apparent how much she likes girls.

Her business class was often one of those times. There's a girl who sits across the room from her. A girl who in colors was be the softest orange Zoe had ever seen, like a sunset. A girl with a laugh that ends in snorts. A girl with curves and a button nose, winged eyeliner and an attitude. Zoe objectively liked watching this girl sometimes.

Her name's Monika Darling, she knows. Sometimes Zoe used to doodle her on the edge of her papers. 

Zoe realizes, that Thursday, it's a bit different. Monika is really more of a bright orange. Menacing. Risky. Monika's orange tinted aura hurts her eyes.

Zoe thinks magenta is a much nicer shade. The type of velvety pomegranate color. It's easy on the eyes and so rich Zoe would like to get lost in it. Zoe's drowning in chrysanthemum lips and pretty eyes.

-

It's a Monday when Zoe shows up to school with magenta streaks in her hair.

She smiles the whole day despite Katy C. and Monika's amazed stares. They aren't bad stares, they're just.. there. Zoe doesn't mind. Zoe feels seen, not necessarily because of all the stares, but instead because when she passes Alana in the halls on the way to Math, the girl stops in her tracks before a smile blooms on her face. Alana _blooms._

-

That Wednesday, they don't study. They just talk. 

And it's nice.

"Hey, for one of my questions today, I was wondering.." Zoe trails off.

"Yeah?"

"Ya like jazz?" she deadpans, makes direct eye contact.

Alana sighs, "I wish I didn't understand where that was from." she redoes her ponytail, "I do, in fact, like jazz."

Zoe scoots closer abruptly. "Dude. We should totally play together sometime!"

"No."

"Why not? I like jazz, you like jazz."

"Just because I like jazz well enough doesn't mean I can play jazz. You have to be the best of the best to play jazz, since it's not necessarily the most routine type of music."

Zoe huffs, and a stray hair flutters upwards with the whoosh of air. "You're no fun."

Alana smiles, all white teeth, and scoots away just a bit. Zoe almost forgot the distance. There's still distance. It never went away. "I'm infamous for low levels of fun."

"What else do you like?" 

"What do you mean?" 

"I know you like magenta, and jazz, but like, what makes your heart race? What makes you passionate? What do you do to relax, what do you enjoy, what are the small things that make your life better?" Zoe wants to know everything. There's never enough time. There's never going to be. Time goes so fast when it's not frozen anymore.

"That was more than one question." Alana points out. "I really like flowers," she averts her eyes from their place straightforward to face the wooden floor. She taps one polished nail against her palm.

"Plants are cool," Zoe affirms.

Alana looks up from the floor, looks at her, and nods. "Yeah. Thanks."

Zoe says "no problem" or really, "no problem?" because she doesn't know what Alana is saying thank you for. But Alana is still never a problem, despite the fact.

"Do you have a favorite band?" 

"Not really? It's kind of an amalgam," she admits.

"I get that," Zoe nods.

"I like pop, and just, upbeat stuff. It helps," she says, in a sort of thoughtful way. Zoe nods. "No music is good too, though." to this, Zoe gasps, pressing a hand to her chest.

"What do you mean by that? How?" Zoe has a look on her face like she just witnessed a slaughter.

"I appreciate silence a lot. I usually just listen to rain noises or relaxing instrumental pieces, if I'm not listening to any of my music." It's all very matter-of-fact.

"So let me get this straight," Zoe takes a breath. "Your favorite band," she pauses, dramatic effect and all, "is the Earth."

"You could say that. Also some others are good, though."

"That's actually really cute," 

Alana blinks, "Thank you." She smiles at the ground. 

"No problem," she returns with her own smile.

"My turn," Alana decides, "Did you dye your hair because of me?"

"Maybe," Zoe says, secret smile playing on her face. The smile that makes Alana feel like they're sharing a private moment, the smile that makes Alana feel like she's special, the smile that feels so real and contagious it makes Alana want to smile too.

"Are you– um, this is weird. I'm sorry. Are you homophobic?"

Zoe's mouth falls open. "What? No! Why would you--" she splutters.

Alana interrupts, "Your brother was talking to me about how he can't join GSA because some of the people in his family aren't that accepting--"

"That's our dad, not me, and even then Larry's honestly not that bad about it--"

"--I was just worried you were involved, maybe. I know you're a good person I just wanted to make sure--"

"Alana."

"--since I'm really not straight.--"

" _Alana._ "

"--I'll be civil if you have a problem with that fact but I don't handle people like that well--"

"I like girls!" she yells, finally, unable to keep her resolve any longer. Alana silences.

"Oh." she blinks.

"I'm not homophobic. In fact, that would literally mean I was intolerable of myself. You're fine."

"I'm sorry."

"About what?" 

"Thinking that you might be, you know." she gestures. 

"It's no problem, really," she means this, "You can never really know for sure."

"Still," Alana is avidly apologetic. She pauses, breathes, then asks, "What beach did you used to go to?"

"It was somewhere in Massachusetts. Half Moon was the name, I think. My mom's family lives there so we used to go a lot."

Alana grins, "We go somewhere in Massachusetts too. At least once a year in the summer. We usually camp there."

"That sounds really nice," Zoe is genuine.

"It's probably my favorite place. I want to take you there. You deserve to see the ocean again."

Zoe nods, "If you invited me, I'd say yes."

"I guess it's a set thing then. We'll see the ocean together one day."

"One day," agrees Zoe.

That week was good.

-

The next week starts off with more practice. The concert is swiftly approaching and Zoe is running out of time. ECAF: the spaces between the Treble Clef lines. EADGBe: names of the strings on her guitar. These run around her brain on repeat. Constant. A rhythm of 4/4 time. 

Ms. Poulain is discreetly watching her from the other side of the music room. Zoe knows she's trying to seem busy, she's trying to seem like she's tending to the music stands, but Zoe can feel eyes on her. She takes a deep breath, and then, she plays. She plays and thinks but nothing of the music. The music and a pair of brown eyes. The music and the smell of daisies. The music and a rainbow flag on the wall. The music and patched lips. Has Zoe's solo always been a love song?

She works on her dynamics, hums along with what she's playing even. Zoe becomes the music. She melts into mezzo piano and crescendos and eighth notes. She floats in the air, somewhere between the lines, somewhere in ECAF. Somewhere with Alana.

She plays the last note, lets it linger in the air, soaks in sound, before it fades. There's silence, Zoe heard the clock tick once, twice, before Ms. Poulain breaks into claps. "Well done, Zoe!"

Zoe smiles, fidgets with her bun. "Thanks, Ms. Poulain."

"If you can play like that during the concert, you're set. Hell, the whole show is probably set." her grin slips off her face, "Don't tell anyone I swore."

Zoe mimes locking her lips.

"Something's changed," Ms. Poulain decides. She has a pondering look on her face, eyebrows drawn close together. 

"You think so?" Zoe asks, intrigued. She puts her guitar away.

Ms. Poulain nods decisively. "I know so."

And then the bell rings, and life begins.

-

Zoe doesn't really know Evan Hansen. 

He's her AP lab partner, and he's insanely smart as well as insanely humble about those smarts. He's always been overwhelmingly sweet to her, and she's always tried to make conversation with him but he's always gotten all nervous and red-faced and Zoe feels like it's her doing. So, she doesn't really make conversation with him outside of class anymore. Regardless, Evan's a nice guy, and that's all that really matters in her book.

It's a Wednesday, a week and two days after she got her hair redone. They're assigned a lab, and of course, that means Zoe and Evan are together.

"So, what's it called when two things come t--"

"I like your hair," Evan blurts.

Zoe blinks, "Thank you?"

"I just, I, um, I mean the streaks? They used to be indigo, right? They're the magenta-y now that you have, and it really suits you– not that the indigo didn't suit you! I just mean, it's, um. It's pretty." Evan finally breathes, "I'm sorry," he says, downcast, eyes glued to the floor.

"Don't be sorry. Thank you, Evan. It's sweet of you to notice," she smiles, pats his back once softly. Evan looks kind of like he's going to pass out.

Silence falls over them for a little. Zoe starts again, "If two objects bump into each other--"

"Your brother--"

They talk at the same time. Evan stumbles out five apologies.

"What about my brother?" Zoe says, eyes narrowed and focused.

His face is as red as an orchard sunset. "I, um. He's my only friend."

Zoe wants to say _he's never mentioned you_ but she made that mistake once before and doesn't plan on repeating it. She realizes there's a lot of things her and Connor don't talk about, a lot of things Connor doesn't mention. Zoe frowns instead, "I'm so sorry."

"Wh-- no, no it's not a bad thing--"

"Did he harass you into being his friend or something? Do you need help?" she stops for a moment, "Evan, did he hurt you?" she says, deadly serious, voice low.

"No, he's genuinely my friend, I was just." he stops, considers, continues, "Is he okay? Like, recently? I haven't been able to talk to him for a bit and--"

Zoe's eyebrows raise. "I wouldn't know." she tells him. "We don't really talk." Yell, maybe. 

"Oh," Evan looks crestfallen. Zoe made another person wilt. Everything she and Connor touch dies. 

"I'm sorry," she apologizes.

Evan just smiles at her sadly. 

"The answer to the question is collision, by the way. When two things come together, fall into each other, maybe destroy each other or make something greater depending on the material. It's collision."

Zoe has a strange feeling Evan isn't just talking about physical science.

-

The first thing Zoe does when she gets home that day is find Connor. It's about 7:30 p.m., after spending an hour or so at Alana's. They usually have family dinner around this time, but she can't be bothered to check the kitchen.

The thing is, Zoe has an unfair advantage. Connor has no lock. It's a good thing for her but it's also a constant reminder that she could lose her brother any day now, and that one thought stirs up an endless emotional turmoil in her life. 

She doesn't open the door, instead she holds it steady, and knocks. Connor grunts what Zoe thinks is close enough to a 'come in'. So she does.

Connor is sitting on the floor, bun and all, surrounded by pencils, graphite smudges on his face. He looks so.. relaxed, for Connor at least. Zoe plops herself down on the bed, facing Connor's back. "You should call him. He's worried about you."

Connor's stroke of the pencil remains steady, even as he lets out a sardonic snort, "Who, now?"

"Evan Hansen? Really nice guy? Says you're his only friend?"

That's when his hand comes to a stuttering halt on the page. "He wasn't supposed to get you involved. Did he ask you to talk to me or something?"

"No, he just seemed concerned about you, he wanted to see if I knew you were okay. I didn't really.. know, so I think you should let him know that you're okay," she murmurs, "or if you're not okay, you should talk about that with him."

"He didn't ask you to talk to me, right?" he's still not facing her.

"No--"

"Then get the fuck out, Zoe. It's not your place. You shouldn't try to fix this and get tangled up in my shit like you always do. Then our family blames me if you end up getting hurt," he says the words darkly, harshly.

"But--"

"I said," pause, "Get. The fuck. Out. Zoe." 

"I just--"

He whips around to face her then, stumbles to his feet, eyes hard and steely. Connor has a storm inside him. He thunders, "GET _OUT_!"

Zoe scurries out as quick as she can, lungs heaving and eyes drooping. She wonders, briefly, if Connor has superpowers. He makes all the walls rumble, he owns yells that shake the very foundation of their house, yells that make Zoe's vision spin pathetically, and rain start running down her face.

Zoe doesn't get much sleep that night. She's too occupied praying that a hurricane won't flood her room

-

When she wakes up the next morning it feels like she's walking in water that pools at her ankles. She knows it's not really there. It still feels like it is. It's dark and cold and she can't see passed it. She changes into her clothes and brushes her teeth and sits down for breakfast.

It's too quiet. It puts her on edge. She watches in disgust as Connor gulps down milk straight from the carton. She'd usually try and stop him, but it stormed all of last night and she doesn't want it to start to rain again. 

Larry clears his throat, "Zoe, your mother and I were talking."

"About what?" Zoe asks, grabbing a piece of toast from the middle of the table. 

"Tomorrow, we think you should bring your friend here instead of going over to her house. We'd like to meet the person you've spent so much time with," Larry says, in trying-too-hard kind.

Her mom picks up where he left off, "It's been so long since either of you had a friend over. I can make dinner, Larry will take the night off early, it'll be so nice."

Zoe knows for a fact that it Will Not be nice. "I don't know--"

"Zoe," her mom pleads.

She sighs, "How about I think about it?"

Larry frowns, "If we don't meet this girl, I'm going to assume she's a bad example," he grumbles.

"Is that a threat?" Zoe questions hesitantly. Her eyes land on Connor for a moment. His face is blank of emotion, but his eyes are observant and cynical. He shifts the carton in his hand.

Larry just looks her straight in the eye, replies, "Is it?"

Zoe knows the answer is yes. Zoe knows she can't afford to lose Alana. She exhales, puts her hands up in surrender, "Fine. I'll see if she's free."

Larry nods, seemingly satisfied.

"Be in the car by 10 minutes, asshole," she whispers to Connor on her way out of the door.

-

Alana accepts the Murphys' invitation with a beaming smile. Zoe wants to scream _you don't know what you're doing! reconsider! please save yourself._ but she doesn't.

"Are you sure?" she asks instead.

Alana nods vigorously, insists, "Absolutely, Zoe. It would be a pleasure."

Zoe wishes this didn't have to happen.

The rest of her day goes alright despite the feeling of an axe hanging above her head the whole time, just waiting for the right second to drop. Trepidation, she guesses.

At the end of rehearsal that day, her jazz band friends actually invite her to go with them for lunch on Saturday. She says yes immediately, like if she's too slow they'll take the offer back. Zoe hasn't hung out with anyone outside of the obligation since the first semester of sophomore year.

Zoe feels known. She's _seen._

She texts Alana right before she leaves home. A quick, _are you sure you want to do this? you can say no._

Alana can say no. She _should_ say no. They should go to her house instead. Zoe loves Alana's house. It's never quiet or frozen and no one ever has real fights. They just communicate and do healthy shit. Alana's house is controlled chaos.

Zoe would make it work with Larry, somehow. Zoe would find a way to keep seeing Alana no matter what her father said or did. Zoe would always find her way back to Alana.

When she gets home, Alana has texted her _I'm totally positive. I'd love to attend your family dinner._

Alana Beck has no knowledge of the axe. It's wildly swinging back and forth now. Could have either of their heads, really. Zoe just hopes it's hers. She hopes it takes hers. Alana doesn't deserve the Murphy family slaughter.

-

The next night arrives too quickly for Zoe's liking. She comes back from play rehearsal; realizes that she barely has any time before Alana enters their house. 

Her mother greets her when she passes through the living room on her way upstairs to change out of her lazy Rehearsal Clothes™. She tries to be nice, grits her teeth like she's biting a bullet. The imaginary axe is teetering at rapid speeds now, she can hear the rope it's fastened to wearing out. 

Once she's changed, hair down and messy from her bun, she leaves her room and finds Connor leaning against his door at the end of the hall. His eyes are closed. She turns to walk downstairs.

"Who's your girlfriend?" he calls from behind her suddenly. Zoe stops.

"She's not my girlfriend, Connor," she says, icicles falling from her mouth. She's so cold, all of the sudden, and she wonders if the water at her ankles has frozen.

"Who's the girl, then?"

She sighs, "Alana Beck? You know her, right?"

Connor is silent for the first time ever. After a while, he finally speaks up, a short "Yeah. I do."

"Well, that's her."

"She's really intimidating, but I like her. I don't know." It's a repeat. Some things never change.

Zoe just returns an "I know."

"I'm happy you're starting to accept yourself." he seems genuine. He doesn't wear genuine well, Zoe realizes when she looks over her shoulder. He won't meet her eyes and he seems very uncomfortable. Genuine on Connor is like a coat that's two sizes too small.

"She's not my girlfriend, Connor."

He puts his hands up in a 'I mean you no harm' kind of way, "I wasn't talking about that." he pushes himself off the wall. "I found the shirt you keep in the very back of the laundry room closet."

"Oh," is all she says. 

It had been a stupid slip-up, really. One of her jazz band friends Finn had mentioned he liked girls and boys, Zoe had whispered "same", but apparently she needs to work on volume control, because suddenly Finn was high fiving her and Aspen was hugging her and there were resounding cheers throughout the entire jazz band and wow, is this what coming out and actually being accepted for it felt like?

Finn decided it was his duty to get her a classic blue, purple, and pink adorned shirt. And Zoe thought it was amazingly sweet of him, and she wanted to wear it in public, she really did, but she wasn't _ready_ yet. She still isn't. 

Zoe wears blue, purple and pink the same way Connor wears genuine. It almost fits but it's not the full story. 

Connor clears his throat awkwardly, "Alana should be here soon, right? We should probably get going."

Zoe nods aloofly. Connor's down two steps when she finally says, "Hey, Connor, wait."

He does, surprisingly.

"Thank you," she tells him.

Connor looks like he wants to respond, like he wants to say so much at once, but instead he only nods. "Let's go."

They climb down the stairs together, and it's uncomfortable, but for the first time since she was nine, Zoe feels like maybe Connor has her back just this once. It's a nice feeling.

They've just gotten off the stairs for about 2 seconds when the doorbell rings and Zoe immediately shouts, "I'll get it!" and bolts to the door.

She swings it open with no hesitance to be greeted by the one and only Alana. "Hello, Zoe!" she chirps. "May I come in?"

Zoe smiles, "Of course." she steps aside and Alana makes her way into the house.

"Dinner isn't quite done yet," Zoe explains, "We only have a few more minutes left though, so you don't need to worry. My mom made this vegan pasta stuff, it'll probably taste bad, so don't say I didn't warn you."

"I admire your mother's dedication to health," Alana says earnestly.

Connor makes his presence known beside them, "I sure don't. Everything we eat for dinner tastes like compost."

Alana ignores this comment. "Connor! It's lovely to see you again."

She seems to mean this. Connor looks taken off-guard. "Um, yeah. You too, Alana."

There's a call from the kitchen, "Zoe, honey, was that your father at the door?"

"No, it was Alana!" she replies.

The conversation ends there.

Connor says, hushed, "I bet you twenty dollars Larry forgot to get the night off."

Zoe simply huffs and rolls her eyes. Alana stays silent, just flits her gaze between the two of them.

After a while of just listening to clatters in the kitchen, Cynthia emerges, tight smile plastered onto her face, hair sticking up in random spots. "H--"

"Hello, Mrs. Murphy! It's incredibly nice to finally meet you, I've heard wonderful things about you," She hadn't. She sticks out her hand insistently.

Cynthia looks a bit taken aback, but she quickly recovers, taking Alana's hand into her own grip. "It's nice meeting you too, Alana. Please call me Cynthia."

Alana smiles in such an uncomfortable way that makes it clear that she will hang on to formalities with everything she has. "Thank you, ma'am."

Cynthia shakes her head with a fond laugh, but doesn't push. "Dinner is ready, but I'm afraid we'll have to wait for my husband Larry." she smiles kindly, this time. It's more real. Connor shoots a finger gun at his head.

"That is absolutely no problem, Mrs. Murphy." Alana makes it known. 

Cynthia leads them into the kitchen, they all sit down at the empty table. 

It's silent for a long time before Connor groans, "Can we just eat already? Please?"

Cynthia grows visibly more tense, "I think we should wait for your father, don't you?"

Zoe knows Connor wants to say no. Hell, Zoe herself wants to say no to that question. Instead, her brother is silent.

A few more minutes pass. Connor can't seem to hold back any longer, "For fuck's sake mom, he's not coming. He probably forgot."

She gives him a reprimanding look, "you know he's more responsible than that. He cares about his family more than that."

Zoe tries not to think about how unsure her mom sounds about her own words.

"He doesn't, though," someone says.

"Zoe," sadness seeps into her mother's voice and she realizes that she's the one who said it.

"We were all thinking it," Connor mutters.

Cynthia seems to give up. She dishes out everyone's food. Vegan alfredo tastes worse cold.

"Thank you for the meal, Mrs. Murphy," Alana's ever-polite.

"I'm glad you liked it," Cynthia's eyes are sad despite her small smile.

"I can help up with dishes if you like," she offers, because of course she does.

"I'm not hungry," Zoe lies and dumps her half eaten pasta in the trash.

"Same," Connor follows.

Alana insists and insists and insists again, but Cynthia won't let her help. It's a Murphy thing. She's the most stubborn despite Alana's amazing persistence skills. Cynthia just keeps telling her that "she's the guest." Throughout the whole interaction, whenever her mother's gaze settles on Zoe, she gives her this wounded puppy look. Zoe does her best to ignore it but it's hard. She goes out onto the back porch to get some fresh air.

Zoe hears it when the axe snaps, but she doesn't feel it right away. She just feels numb.

The door opens. Alana takes a seat next to her. "Your mother is more strong-willed than I am," she says in bewilderment, like it's an astonishing feat. It probably is.

"Yeah, that's kind of how my family is." she chuckles in a watery way.

"You have mascara on your cheeks," Alana notices, her voice sounding so far away. "Wait, Zoe, are you crying?"

"Am I?" she wobbles. She reaches up to feel her face, and sure enough, it comes back moist. "Oh. I guess I am." she laughs a bit, it doesn't really sound right.

"Oh, Zoe," Alana whispers, and for the first time, the gap is closed. Their thighs are pressed tightly together. The proximity is nice. It's grounding, in a way. It reminds Zoe that she's actually corporeal.

"Alana?" her hands are shaking.

"Yeah?"

"Are we friends?" she wraps shaking hands around herself. Alana is quiet, Zoe's too scared to look at her face. "You always call me your close acquaintance, which is fine, but I just. You're my friend. Hell, you're my best friend. You mean a lot to me."

"Yes," Alana blurts, "Or I mean. I want to be. I was scared you wouldn't want to be friends with me. Especially because of the whole tutor thing," she admits, "I don't call anyone a friend anymore. I often miss social cues, so I'd rather be safe than sorry."

Zoe's still crying, but she's also smiling. "God, I'm so sorry this dinner was such a mess."

"It's fine. I still had a nice time. It was interesting to observe your family dynamics." Alana bumps Zoe's shoulder with her own.

Zoe tries to wipe away her tears, but they just keep coming. She rubs her eyes until they start to sting a bit, and Alana grabs one of her wrists. "I don't think that's very good for your eyes. It's okay to cry, Zoe. It's actually healthy for your body."

"Do you remember the first time we met?" she asks, suddenly.

"You were crying then, too."

"Yeah." Zoe nods. There's a quiet remembrance about it all. She speaks up, out of the blue, "Can I call you Lana sometimes? Your family does."

"No one outside of my family's ever called me that," It's not a yes or no. Alana seems to realize this afterwards, because then she says, "You can be the first."

"Thank you for being here for me." Zoe starts crying harder. 

"I'm glad I can be," Alana sounds like she means this with every bone in her body, "Can I call you Zo, then?" It's a bit tentative.

"Of course you can," she leans her head on Alana's shoulder. There's quiet for a bit.

"You have goosebumps on your legs," Alana acknowledges. It's a disguised question.

"I'm not ready to go in yet, is that okay?" Zoe says, eyes drooping a bit.

"Absolutely." and then, "I'll be right back."

Alana leaves. Zoe didn't realize how warm Alana was keeping her until her teeth start to chatter. 

Zoe hears the sliding glass door open again, but she doesn't bother moving. Alana's footsteps are soft. 

She sits back down and drapes a thick Spiderman print blanket over them both. "Just for the record, I think you're insane for wearing just shorts and a short-sleeved shirt this late in the year."

"Be quiet, it's my fashion sense," Zoe grows confused, "Where did you–?" 

"I asked Connor if you guys had any spare blankets and he threw this at my face."

"I expect nothing less from him," Zoe snorts.

The tears have stopped, but an aching has burrowed itself deep into her chest and made a home. She feels so after-cry tired. It's the same feeling as when you spend a whole day in a swimming pool and then reality feels a bit funny when you leave.

Zoe's head takes its place back on Alana's shoulder. They fit together so well that Zoe wonders, briefly, through an emotionally exhausted mind, if Alana's shoulders were specifically made for her head. It's possible.

"Do you want to talk about it? I can be bad with feelings, but I can try. For you," There's something there in that sentence that makes warmth spread throughout Zoe's body in a wave.

She sniffs, rubs the top of her nose, "I guess it's a lot. The world is kind of a lot for me right now. Especially my family, though," she gets quieter, "I can't believe my dad forgot about tonight."

"I'm really sorry he did," Alana apologizes softly.

"He was like, threatening me that if he didn't meet you he'd assume you were a bad influence which is ridiculous because you're obviously the best influence I could have, in like, the whole entire school, but he was so insistent and then he just goes and misses this." her hands clench together where they're resting on her knees.

"You have a right to be upset." Alana hums sadly. She unfolds Zoe's hands, an explanation of, "You'll hurt yourself." Crescent moon nail marks are the only proof her hands were ever pressed together at all. They sit there for a while longer, just simply being grateful for the fact the other exists.

Eventually Cynthia opens the door, gently, like she's scared she's going to break something. "I'm sorry girls, I hate to interrupt, but you know the rules. Curfew and all. I'll give you a ride home, Alana."

Alana nods in understanding, gets up very slowly, almost like she's trying not to spook a wild animal. She gives Zoe a hand and pulls her up as well. "See you on Monday, Zo," she says, and pulls her into a hug. She whispers, feather light, "I know the world is a lot, but I'll be here to try to make it feel less." Zoe's entire body tingles. Alana's breath is warm against her neck, it makes her hair stand on end. Her heart feels like it's on fire.

When Alana pulls away, Zoe asks, "Promise?"

"Promise." Alana smiles. She turns to address Cynthia.

"Thank you so much for having me, Mrs. Murphy." She holds out her hand for Cynthia to shake, but she instead finds herself pulled into a hug.

"It's no problem, Alana. You're welcome here whenever."

"Thank you, Mrs. Murphy."

And they leave.

"So, wait, I'm confused," Connor says, the moment the door closes.

Zoe groans, "About what?" 

"You said she's not your girlfriend?" 

"No, Connor." Zoe flops down onto the couch, longways, pulling the Spiderman blanket tighter around her.

"Are you sure?" he drawls, skeptically.

She shoots him an unamused glare.

"You like her then, right?" Zoe's face probably gives it away, because Connor adopts a shit-eating grin. "Oh my God, you totally do."

"Shut the fuck up, Connor." She hurls the closest pillow next to her at him. 

He deflects her best defenses with a single raised arm. "I won't tell her," he takes on a serious tone.

"Thank you." she breathes a sigh of relief.

"For what it's worth, I think she likes you back," Connor lets her know.

"Right." Zoe rolls her eyes.

"I'm being serious."

They never finish talking, because the door opens, and there's Cynthia, beaming. "You chose a good friend, Zoe. She's a keeper."

-

Zoe doesn't stick around to hear Larry's half-hearted apologies the next day. She's out the door, in the car, at the 50's diner in less than 15 minutes. She's greeted by a small section of the jazz band. They've never really hung out outside of school before, but they've always included Zoe in their group when actually talking in jazz band. She would sit with them instead of Katy C. if it weren't for the unfortunate matter of separate lunch periods.

They all form a line, Zoe ends up somewhere in the middle. Somewhere between the cracks in the sidewalk. Somewhere in ECAF. 

Finn, gangly and probably a good 4ish inches taller than Zoe, rests his elbow on her shoulder. The line starts to become more of a cluster when Yasmin comes to stand by them. There's laughter everywhere and Zoe wonders the last time she was voluntarily around so many people.

Finn orders a peanut butter and chocolate milkshake, Yasmin orders a cherry one; Zoe orders strawberry. Then it's waiting. Yasmin tells her she's adorable when she makes some dumb joke, Finn nudges her and tells her to sit next to him in the booth. Zoe feels like maybe she has friends. She can't stop smiling, soaking in the energy. 

She sits down with them at a red sparkly booth and wonders if Connor was right when he said she was an extrovert. She examines her surroundings. This is the type of place the girls she sits with at Katy C.'s table would take pictures of and post them to Instagram with the hashtag 'aesthetic'. It's a cool little place, she'll admit.

They talk about their pieces, and Ms. Poulain, and how hard the alto sax part is. They talk about how much air is required for flute and how hard that is for Jyoti, an asthmatic. Some of the girls branch into how much they wish there was a jazz choir at their school. 

A few people start trying to get people to play truth or dare. Zoe feels uncomfortable and hopes that everyone ignores them the same way she is. Unfortunately, Bayani is loud and orange-mannered and obnoxious and he draws all attention to him. 

Suddenly, Yasmin is no longer pressed into her side but excitedly bounding to the circle that's formed on the probably really gross floor. Finn looks at her, asks, "Do you want to go play?"

Zoe shrugs, picks at her indigo nails. 

"It's okay, I don't really want to either," she can tell he's lying.

"You can, I don't mind."

"I'd rather spend time with you." he stretches. Zoe doesn't think this is a lie. "Wanna get some fresh air?" She nods.

He holds the weathered black and red door open for her, the bell jingles as they go. Her milkshake is phenomenal– it's not as great as A La Mode, but it's still very good.

"Zoe, we're friends right?" Finn asks, leaning against the white railing in front of the shop.

"Of course we are." Zoe laughs. They are. He's a sax player and the sax section is right next to her so they talk all the time. Finn has always been kind to her.

-

When she finally arrives home, Larry's waiting on the couch for her. She freezes in the doorway.

"Zoe, care to take a seat?" She does so wordlessly. "I'm sorry for missing last night."

"It doesn't matter," It's the truth.

"It does. My family matters to me."

"You sure have a strange way of showing it," Zoe mutters under her breath.

Larry cocks an eyebrow, "What'd you say?"

"It doesn't matter," she repeats.

"Zoe, it does! I'm your father, you will tell me what you said," he demands.

She feels the pressure in her rising. She's effusive. Her anger is not a flow but an explosion, "You don't care. Dad, do you not see the severed connection you have with Connor? Do you not see how little you know about both of us? Do you not see how hard mom is trying to keep this family together while you've given up? Hell, we've all given up, but you the most!"

"That's ludicrous, Zoe! I care! I'm trying!" Larry booms. Zoe suddenly realizes where Connor inherited the lightning in his veins.

"What instrument do I play in jazz band? What calms Connor down after a hard day?" She asks him, but she knows she'll get no answer before she even sets the questions free into the air.

He makes a mangled noise. "This isn't fair, Zoe."

"Answer the questions, dad,"

"Saxophone..?" 

"Oh my god." she heaves a harsh, disbelieving laugh. "You really don't know anything about us."

"I want to," Larry's eyes are pleading. He's desperately grabbing onto anything he can of their family relationship.

"Do you really, though?" is the last thing she says before she leaves the room. It's quiet, but maybe that's the point. 

It's raining.

-

The halls feel a little less lonely on Monday. Zoe has firm confirmation that she has at least two (2) friends. Connor has her back sort of, in this odd, almost unbelievable way. The air feels lighter. She breathes easy for a while.

The air gets heavier again however when she sees Alana rushing down the hallway with watery red eyes on her way to 6th period. Her walk is determined as always, presence demanding, Zoe doesn't think anyone else would ever even notice there was something wrong.

She immediately asks her Spanish teacher if she can go to the bathroom (a rough _¿maestro puedo ir al baño?_ because they can only speak strictly Spanish). She says _sí_ in response and Zoe's out the door faster than it takes someone to say _adios._

She counts her lucky stars for the fact she saw which bathroom Alana was heading towards or else she'd be forced to search their school, which is a task that sounds dreadful, but still a task she'd do for Alana. Zoe's starting to wonder if there's a task she _wouldn't_ do for Alana.

It doesn't take her very long to find the bathroom. The room is silent when she enters, but that's to be expected. A lot of teenagers in high school are forced to learn the art of Silent Crying. Alana seems to have mastered that skill along the way of all her other amazing achievements. 

"Lana?" Zoe calls, stepping a bit further into the bathroom.

"Zoe?" she replies, a sniff following the words.

"Yeah, it's me," she confirms. "Do you want to talk?" 

"Honestly?" Alana sounds so tired.

"Of course."

"Not really, no," she admits.

"That's okay," Zoe assures. She comes closer to the stall she thinks Alana's probably in. "Do you want to come out? No pressure, obviously,"

"..No to that, either," her voice is wavy, a huge contrast from usual. Alana's voice is steady and precise. Eloquent, like pulled taffy. "Can you just– can you stay?"

"Absolutely." Zoe makes herself comfortable on the other side of the door. She listens to the little, barely audible noises Alana makes. She listens to her shaky breathing.

It's silent for a while. "Can you.. distract me?" Alana requests, a little uncertain.

"My favorite flower is an iris, what's the meaning of that?" She presses her head and hands against the stall door, leaning. It's probably incredibly unsanitary but Zoe doesn't really care right now. All she wants is to be close to Alana.

"Your friendship means so much to me." Alana's breathing gets just a little lighter, like the flutter of butterfly wings.

"Ha, I should get you a bouquet of irises."

Alana laughs, and it sounds a little odd, but it's progress. "You're too nice to me."

"You deserve kindness," she says truthfully. "What's something else you like?"

"The ocean," Alana gives.

"I already knew that one though," she complains.

"Fine." Alana goes quiet with thought, "Rain."

Zoe hates the rain. "What about it?"

"It's just so calming. It makes me happy. There's some sort of magic to it– I've always been drawn to water. I wish I could say more, because there is more, but I just don't know how to explain it," she sounds more frustrated at the end, words evading her. 

"It's okay. Some things are beyond words," Zoe wants to say _our relationship is beyond words, now, isn't it? We started out being around each other just for words, for English tutoring that I didn't even need, and yet here we are._ The words don't come out.

Instead, Zoe imagines that Alana nods when she responds, "I think you're right about that."

"What about red carnations? My mom has those in her garden, and they're really beautiful." she pulls her forehead away but doesn't move otherwise.

Alana sucks in a breath. It's scarcely noticeable, but Zoe hears it anyway. "My heart aches for you," she says it quietly, in a barely above a whisper kind of way. The same way someone would say a secret. Zoe feels like there's weight to the words. Suddenly all is different. It's not drastic. There's a change in the atmosphere, just slightly.

"Oh."

"I'm ready to come out now," the words are a bit sheepish.

Zoe steps aside. "By all means."

Alana exits tentatively. She gives Zoe an unsure smile. "Thank you for staying with me. I'm sorry I didn't come out right away, I just knew I probably looked like a mess."

"You never do." Zoe has a temporary lapse of control of her own mouth. She explains further, trying to bring the words back, trying to fix what isn't broken in the first place, "I just mean that like– you're very particular and you put a lot of effort into professionalism. And it's okay to be a mess sometimes anyway. We're all human, I guess? Forget I said anything."

Alana blinks, a bit surprised at so much information, "Thank you, Zo. For everything."

The bell rings, and suddenly people are flooding the bathroom, Zoe asks, "Are you sure you're ready to go back?

Alana nods determinedly. "I can do this."

Zoe smiles, places a hand on her shoulder encouragingly, "I know you can." she laces her hand with Alana's. The other girl looks up, a silent question written on her face. "It's so I can walk you to your next class and we won't get separated in the crowd."

Alana seems satisfied with that.

Zoe is not. She wants more. She wants to hold Alana's hands for a reason more than not getting lost in a crowd and that scares her.

She puts the butterflies in her stomach in a bottle to ignore them until a future date.

-

That future date where her feelings need to be confronted is a week and a half later, the following Friday. She and Alana had somehow come up with plans to have a sleepover.

It starts out normal. She knocks on the door, Mrs. Beck greets her far more warmly than she deserves, she heads up to Alana's room. Routine.

Alana's sitting on her bed, book lightly propped in her hands. Zoe notices the music pouring from the speakers ( _will you wait for me?_ ). Alana doesn't seem aware of Zoe's presence, her eyes intent and focused on the pages.

Zoe should've knocked before entering, but Alana told her she could just come in when she got there. She flicks to the next page, and Zoe figures that's the best place to interrupt. She knocks against the wall. 

"Oh! Hey," she greets. Hastily, a bookmark is placed in between the pages of her book and it's snapped shut. 

"Hi," Zoe greets back. Alana pats a spot on the bed, not as far as usual. "What were you reading?" she asks as soon as she's sitting.

Alana twists her book to look at the front cover. "Poetry. Surprisingly," she sounds sort of awestruck herself. 

"Do you not usually read poetry?" she leans back a bit.

"Not really, no." she releases a deep sigh. "I never really thought I'd like it. I've always thought my brain is always running too much on high to really appreciate it, but something compelled me in Barnes and Noble to pick this up."

"How are you liking it so far?" she prompts Alana to keep going.

"A good amount. Turns out, my nitpick-y side kind of helps me understand the symbolism."

"That's good!" she exclaims.

"How about you? Do you like poetry?" 

"Well, I love music, and music is just poetry with lots of additions, typically."

"That's a good way to look at it."

They're quiet for a moment. The song through Alana's speakers changes to Ariana Grande.

"Dinner's going to be done in just a little bit. I invited you over pretty late, my apologies." Alana stands, placing her book back on her shelf. Everything is so organized. Zoe's own room is quite the opposite.

"Don't apologize. I know you were busy." Zoe's lips pull up into a smile. Alana had told her at lunch that day she had more community service than usual that particular day. Zoe understood.

Alana smiles back at her.

"You should play clarinet for me."

"I'm really not that good." Alana tucks a stray hair behind her ear absentmindedly.

Zoe lifts an eyebrow, "Are you sure?"

"Yes, Zoe, I'm sure. We can't all be musical geniuses." her smile grows.

They talk, and they laugh, and things are okay. They eat dinner, and the Becks are so nice and warm.

After dinner is finished, Alana and Zoe head back up to the room. Alana closes the door behind her, leans against it for a few seconds, eyes fluttered shut. She just breathes for a while. It's an affirmation that she's alive. They both are.

Zoe seems to forget sometimes.

Eventually, Alana takes one last deep breath in through her nose and opens her eyes. Zoe definitely doesn't have to pull her gaze away from her lips. "Sorry," she breaks the quiet, apologetic smile on her face.

"Don't be," Alana has nothing to be sorry for.

"You can DJ." She places her phone in Zoe's hands before going about tidying up a bit of her desk.

Wolfish grin, Zoe speaks, "I've been waiting my whole life for this."

Alana snorts. 

After Alana finally finishes decluttering, she sits on the bed with a bounce. Zoe stops her music.

The girl next to her wears a pondering, thoughtful expression. "What?" Zoe asks. She wants to know what's going on in Alana's head.

"It would be rude to read in front of you, right? It feels like that book is calling to me, but I don't want to make you feel out of place." Alana gestures to the nightstand where the book lays. 

"It wouldn't be rude if you included me," Zoe suggests.

"What do you mean?" she asks quizzically.

"I mean.. you could read it to me."

"No." The answer is immediate.

"I'll just have to assume you're rude then," Zoe fakes, dramatically. 

"How tragic," Alana drones. She picks up her book, finds her spot.

"Oh come _on_! You're no fun!" Zoe pouts, bumping Alana's leg with her own. Alana looks at her with both eyebrows raised. "Please read it to me?"

She lets out a sigh, "How about we just both read it?" She scoots closer to Zoe until space is almost entirely eliminated. The book is cradled in between them, against their thighs. Zoe grabs one half of the book with her own hand.

Zoe tries to read, she _does_ , but she's hyperaware of their arms brushing and Alana's stray hair from earlier touching her cheek. Alana's a much faster reader than her too, so it's Zoe's job to flip the pages, and she ends up skipping a majority of the poems. 

After one particular one, Alana admires breathlessly, "That one was written in such an interesting style."

Zoe swallows, "Yeah."

Alana laughs, not in a mean-spirited way, "That's your only input?"

"Shut up." Zoe buries her face in her available hand.

Alana just laughs a little bit more before considerately pulling the book away and closing it. She leaves the bed to put it on the bookshelf before returning. "Do you want to sleep?"

"Sleep, or turn out the lights?" Zoe lifts her face from her hand to look at Alana. And wow, is she happy to have done so. Alana is flushed with laughter, and her eyes have this light trapped inside of them, and her smile is so wide.

"Probably the latter, possibly both."

"Okay. Sounds good. I'll go change into my pjs in the bathroom." she pulls herself off the bed and to the bathroom. She tries to change as quickly as she can.

When she's done, she exits, and knocks on Alana's bedroom door before she enters to make sure Alana's decent.

Alana's pajamas are practical. Just sweatpants and a fuzzy shirt. Zoe's, on the other hand, are not. Her shirt is adorned with suspiciously Club-Penguin-esque looking penguins; her pants are bright pink and covered in pizza slices. She wears them shamelessly, almost proudly.

Alana removes her glasses and rubs her eyes. She rolls over to the spot closest to the wall and lifts the covers for Zoe. Zoe crawls in and turns off the light. She can still see Alana in pale light coming through the window. She can see the freckles dotted along her face and her warm eyes and soft lips and how achingly close Alana's hands are to her own, and oh god, Zoe _likes_ Alana. Zoe likes Alana a huge amount.

She takes a deep breath, bites her lips."Why were you crying last week?" 

"Just a really hard day," Alana confides. "You know how I'm gay?"

Zoe nods.

"It's always hard to deal with ignorance." she closes her eyes for a few seconds. Zoe watches the calming motion of her chest rising and falling. They're alive together. _They're alive._

"I understand." she touches her fingers to Alana's arm as an _I'm here_ just for a second or two. Alana grabs her hand when it leaves and pulls it back to her.

"I'm out at school, because no matter what anyone says, I know that there's nothing wrong with the way I am. But still, despite my confidence in who I am, the comments really get to me sometimes. I get so angry. Not that anyone deliberately says anything to me, just. In my general vicinity. And I can't even talk sense into them because they're just. Terrible. You know?" she spirals.

Zoe rubs her thumb across Alana's hands in patterns, "I do." she looks up and ends up meeting Alana's eyes. She lets out a steady breath she didn't know she was holding.

Alana eye contact falters. "People can just be.. so dumb."

"I know," Zoe articulates, "It's hard just overhearing all the bigotry."

"Thank you, Zo," Zoe can barely see Alana's smile. She lets go of Zoe's hand, and Zoe wants to say _stop, wait, come back,_ but she doesn't. She goes to sleep. 

The rain stops, and the sun comes out.

-

The distance is obliterated. Zoe and Alana continue to spend time with each other, and suddenly, the gap doesn't exist anymore. It's both great and torture at the same time.

It gets harder and harder to focus in the classes she has with Alana because her brain turns to rose gold coloured static. It's hard to focus when Alana's absent too, though, because it feels weird to not have someone to make funny faces at across the room and have them roll their eyes and smile in response. It feels weird not being able to turn around in the middle of science, a class she does not share with Alana, and shout _hey! look! the teacher's talking about earth! your favorite band!_ It's weird when someone says some terribly homophobic thing to not be able to send someone a glance and get an empathetic one in return.

Fortunately, her GPA doesn't suffer from this lack of focus. Zoe has too much time away from home for that to be possible, probably. Her and Connor got in a fight a while ago about which cereal they should get from the store, and it sounds like something silly, but it quickly devolved into screaming. They've been actively avoiding each other ever since.

Something worth mentioning is also the concert creeping up to them. It's lurking just a few days away now. Zoe thinks she's prepared. Finn, however, is a _mess_. His girlfriend is coming to see it so he's attempting to make everything perfect. It's quite amusing to watch from an outside point of view.

The week of a concert is usually complete and utter chaos, so Zoe is used to occurrences like this after 3 three years. She, herself, always likes to prepare fully the week _before_ the concert. She makes sure her solo is flawless, that she knows all her parts, sticks up the invitation on her fridge where her mom will eventually see it the day before; even picks out her outfit. Zoe's prepared.

Except suddenly, the day of the concert, Alana springs on her that she will be in attendance and abruptly, all of Zoe's plans are crumbling before her eyes. She's sure she's gaping, and Alana looks concerned, but she can't help it. She snaps her mouth closed, nods once and says, "That's great! I hope you enjoy it, we work really hard."

"I know." Alana smiles. "I've been to a lot of them."

When Zoe gets home, she practices her guitar solo until her fingers are purple. She rethinks her outfit, rummages through her entire closet. Zoe is Underprepared. This is something that usually never happens to her. Alana has flipped her plans upon their heads.

Despite all this, the concert still comes. That night at 6, Zoe has prepared as much as she can, yet she still feels nervous. Her hands are shaky which is always unhelpful as a musician. 

She begins to tune with everyone else, and realizes that even though she's nervous she's also excited. She loves performing and she's proud of how far the jazz band has come. She can do this.

They play their normal songs, Ms. Poulain tries to make jokes ('tries' being the keyword), the brass quartet starts playing, and everything goes great. Zoe listens to the deep sound of the brass music and steels her nerves. She's next. Anticipation makes her head feel a bit dizzy, but she just breathes, does her best not to panic. She attempts to smooth out the creases in her dress while she waits.

The brass quartet finishes, Zoe pulls her instrument and a chair to the front of the stage. Ms. Poulain introduces her and her piece. It helps that Zoe can't see the crowd. She fixes her posture, takes a deep breath, and imagines that she's just back in the music room, imagines she's with Alana. She feels herself smiles. One time Evan Hansen told her that her smile when she was performing looked like she was letting people in on a secret.

She slips up on one note, but she tries not to make it obvious. She doesn't let it show on her face and she keeps going, so she doesn't think anyone notices. By the end, she's beaming. It went well. Ms. Poulain gives her a little clap, and the crowd erupts. It sounds like ocean waves, almost. 

They have two more pieces, and then just like that, the concert is over. Everything they had been working on for months is gone in an hour. Zoe gets and gives congratulations, she stays to help clean up, and apparently so does Alana because Zoe bumps into her when carrying two chairs back from the stage.

"Zo! That was amazing!" Alana gushes. 

"Thanks." she gives her a huge grin. 

Alana takes one of her chairs and walks with her to the music room. They stack their chairs, Alana pulls her into a hug and Zoe thinks that she's probably glowing. 

"I'm so grateful for you," Zoe says, sincere. The crowd of musicians are thinning out around them. 

"I love you," Alana blurts.

Zoe blinks, comes in a beat too late, "I–" 

"I didn't mean to say that," she says, bewildered, then apologizes. She tries to make a run for it but Zoe snags her elbow when she rushes passed.

"Alana, wait, let me speak," The room empties, and it's only them. Alana won't meet her eyes. "I love you too."

Alana smiles, slow and small, hugs her one more time before her phone dings and she has to leave. Zoe stands in the middle of an empty band room.

It's weird being in a quiet place where it's usually roaring loud. It's one of those places where reality feels a little skewed, the places that usually make Zoe wonder what's real and what's not, but that doesn't happen this time. She waits for it to, yet still nothing. Zoe feels a smile slowly blossoming on her face.

"So that's what changed your music," Ms. Poulain's voice carries.

Zoe jumps, "How long have you been there?"

"Just now, but I did run into Alana Beck before I came in." She has this childlike, knowing smile on her face. 

Zoe feels her face heat up. "I guess."

"I'm going to work on the lesson plan for next week." She walks into her office and closes the door.

Zoe texts Connor to come get her, to which he responds, shockingly, with _look on the stage fucker_. She retraces her steps and surely enough, Connor's laying on the stage looking blankly up to the ceiling, motionless. When Zoe approaches, he says, "Dammit, why couldn't I have been the talented one in the family."

Zoe knows it's the closest thing she'll get to a compliment. She takes it, feels the small smirk on her face. It feels amazing to actually have Connor to appreciate her on something, for once, maybe. She extends an arm for Connor to take. He seems to be full of surprises today because he actually takes her hand and lets her drag him up. 

"You know, I'm not the only talented one in the family," she says, when they're walking into their house after the car ride home. "I mean, have you seen your art?"

Connor grumbles, "Shut the fuck up," but Zoe catches a glimpse of his smile.

-

When she returns to her house from school the next day, Larry's waiting for her on the couch again. She attempts to walk passed him but he lifts a hand and calls, "Zoe, wait," His voice is pelting, raining down.

She does as she's told, "What?"

"Take a seat, please," Larry orders, overly civil.

She takes her seat wordlessly. She's stricken with a sense of deja vu.

"I want you to invite your friend Alana to stay over tomorrow night. I plan on being here."

Zoe crosses her legs. "I'll think about it."

"Zoe--"

"Don't try and threaten me again if you aren't even going to be here." She rises from her chair, grabs her guitar, and ascends the stairs.

-

"Hey, Lana, do you want to sleepover at my house tomorrow?" Zoe asks, in the fantasy section in the library at lunch. 

Alana's hands fumble, her book falls to the ground. She scurries to pick it back up. She looks up at Zoe from the ground, book finally back in her hands, "Sorry, what?"

"Do you want to sleepover at my house tomorrow?" Zoe asks, "I know my house is kind of chaotic, and you don't have to come if you don't want to, but--"

"No, no, I genuinely didn't hear you the first time." Alana pulls herself up from the ground. "I'd love to come."

Zoe doesn't know how anyone can think of the prospect of coming to her house and smile. "Cool."

"Cool," Alana mimics.

-

Larry does, in fact, show up. Before even Alana does. Apparently he got the whole evening off. Zoe sort of wishes he hadn't. She doesn't really pay him any mind, passes him to climb the stairs immediately.

Her room is already fairly clean but she tidies up more anyway. She's halfway through refolding her clothes when there's a knock at the door.

"Come in!" she answers.

Connor shuts the door behind him and jumps onto her bed. 

He lays there, silent for a while, before he speaks up, "Hey, Alana likes flowers, right?" 

"Yeah?" Zoe says, puzzled.

"Oh my god, you are so _gay_."

"Connor, you are literally the gayest person I know." she rolls her eyes, completes cleaning the third drawer of her dresser. She moves onto the fourth.

"Yeah, well, I don't wear shirts with trees on them just because Evan likes trees," Connor snorts.

Zoe looks at herself in the mirror, then looks at Connor, startled, "This was actually total coincidence."

"You've _got_ to be kidding me."

"I'm not," she says, honestly.

"Wow. So whipped that your subconscious is trying to impress her."

"Shut _up_."

Connor stays in her room while she tidies. He plays a lot of the oldie music they used to listen to as kids, and it's nice. They don't talk much, distance makes them feel like maybe their voices won't carry after all this time. Voices never carry unless they yell in this house. They're all just too far away from each other.

Still, Connor and Zoe aren't screaming. In fact, they're silently coexisting and enjoying each other's company. It feels sort of backwards, yet it's nice.

The doorbell rings a half an hour after Zoe has finished making her room as spotless as possible. She sprints downstairs, but Larry makes it to the door before her. Damn.

"Hello, Mr. Murphy! I'm Alana Beck, a senior, student council vice president, and your daughter's friend. It's a pleasure to meet you," Zoe hears Alana's cheery tone from around the corner. When she turns, she finds Alana shaking her father's hand with vigor.

"Um, hello there, Alana." Larry looks at Zoe helplessly. Zoe understands. Alana can come off a bit strong sometimes, but she likes that a lot about her. She's really passionate. 

"Holy shit, Larry literally has no idea what to do with her," Connor whispers.

"I know," Zoe whispers back, "It's awesome."

"You need to keep her around," Connor decides. Zoe finds herself agreeing with him. She doesn't know how she got lucky enough to have Alana be in her life, but she does need to keep her around.

"Alana!" she yells, bypassing her father and embracing her friend into a hug. Alana reciprocates it almost immediately.

"Hi, Zo," she says, beaming.

"Wanna say hi to my mom then head upstairs?"

"Of course!" Alana sounds genuinely enthusiastic, somehow.

Zoe leads her to the kitchen. Her mom hugs Alana, oven mits and all. "It's nice to see you again, Alana," she tells her warmly.

"You as well, Mrs. Murphy." Alana pulls away, smiling. Zoe grabs her hand and leads the way out the room, up the stairs, to her own room. They sit down. 

"Your room's lovely, Zoe," Alana compliments, looking around, eyes filled with wonder. Zoe observes her fondly. 

Zoe's room is painted periwinkle. She has a bunk bed with dark plum bed sheets, a bright purple lava lamp, and multicolored, different shapes and sizes of glow-in-the-dark stars covering every inch of her walls and ceiling. There's a fake solar system hanging in the room, as well. There are pictures of pianos and sheet music stacked on a desk. 

Zoe sits down in a spinny chair and slides closer to Alana in it. "Do you play piano?" Alana's eyes continue to scan the room.

"No, but Connor used to," Zoe answers, a sort of sad lilt to her voice. "He was really good at it. My mom's friends would listen to him and call him a prodigy. We'd even do duets sometimes. He hasn't played in years, though." she says, quieter then, "I miss it."

"I'm sorry." Alana frowns distinctly.

"It's okay." Zoe stands from her chair. "Any requests on what we should do until dinners ready?"

"Maybe we should work on some English stuff? We haven't in a really long time." She sits up a bit straighter.

"Alana, my grade in English is an A+," Zoe sounds amused.

"We should make sure it stays that way--"

"I don't need tutoring Alana." Zoe moves to sit next to her on the bed, a bit gingerly at first. "I just want to hang out with you as friends. Not as my tutor or anything. It doesn't have to be about school anymore. Just us," her words are gentle.

"Just us?" Alana looks like she doesn't know what to do with this.

"Just us," she confirms.

"That sounds.. nice," Alana admits.

"Good."

Zoe gets up, plugs in her speaker to her phone. When the speaker lights up, Zoe explains, excitedly, "The colors change to the beat. I just got this yesterday and I've been looking forward to use it this whole time."

She outstretches her hand to Alana who delicately takes it. Zoe pulls her up and twirls her. They dance in the light of fairy lights, glow-stickers, a lava lamp and a light up speaker. Zoe's dizzy in the best way possible. 

They slow dance on one of the more downbeat songs. Zoe murmurs, head tucked into the crook of Alana's shoulder, "You know, the reason I have a bunk bed is because Connor would spend the night on the floor in here so consistently that my parents bought us one so he could sleep in here whenever he wanted."

Alana smiles, tightens her grip, just a little, "That's so sweet."

"Yeah." Zoe laughs a bit. "When he was eleven, they didn't want to take it back out."

"Why?" Alana asks.

"I don't know. Maybe it was laziness, maybe it made them to sad because it made it more real. I like the top bunk better anyway though, so it's okay."

"Yeah, I saw that the bottom was basically just a place to keep your guitar," Alana says.

"That's true." she smiles.

There's a little pause where they just listen, for a while. Or at least, Zoe listens. To the music, to Alana's heartbeat. She feels her socks sink into the beige carpet.

"We would make constellations out of those stars on the ceiling," she starts again. Alana rubs her thumb in a circle on her waist that Zoe interprets as a silent _I'm listening_. She continues, "Especially when I'd have a nightmare. He'd distract me until I wasn't scared anymore. He said he'd protect me from the monsters." They continue to sway steadily, "Unfortunate that he couldn't protect me from himself, I guess."

Alana rubs a hand on her back. They aren't really dancing anymore, just holding each other and swaying in time. "I'm sorry, Zoe," she whispers. "I wish I could help."

"You help enough by existing." Zoe takes a deep breath in through her nose. The song changes to something loud and high energy and Zoe turns away to stop it. There's a small pause where Zoe looks at her wall and Alana looks at Zoe. 

The silence is broken by a booming yell of, "Dinner's ready!" from Larry.

Zoe sighs, turns her head to Alana, "I guess we should go."

"Yeah. That's a good idea," Alana agrees, distantly. 

They exit the room and descend down the stairs together. They end up sitting on opposite sides of the table: Zoe next to Connor, Alana next to Cynthia. Larry sits at the head to protect his fragile masculinity.

Clinking of forks, scraping of knives, the sound of Alana talking and people actually talking back. The same but different. The lights seem less harsh in her eyes. 

Larry is still completely silent but he looks almost terrified, which Connor points out to Zoe, chuckling under his breath. Cynthia eagerly asks Alana questions. It goes surprisingly well, if not a bit awkward. Cynthia is completely enamored by Alana.

"Alright, well, if you girls are done you can head upstairs whenever you like. I'm making some cookies. I'll let you know when they're done." Cynthia smiles brightly.

Alana looks at Zoe, "Are you ready to go upstairs?"

Zoe nods and stands up. "Thanks for dinner, mom."

"Of course!" Cynthia cheers.

When they get to the room, Zoe grabs her guitar and takes her place back on the spinny chair right away.

"Does your guitar have a name?" Alana sits back down on the bottom bunk.

Zoe grins, "You're catching on, Beck."

Alana simply smiles too. "I learn from the best."

"Her name's Venus because she's beautiful," Zoe states, lovingly.

Alana shakes her head, but it's in an endeared way. "I should have figured."

"Did you ever name your plant?"

"Lupita." Alana crosses her legs. 

"I like it. It fits."

"Thank you."

Zoe plucks a bit distractedly. 

"You should play something."

"I thought you would never ask." a flash of teeth. She takes a deep breath, "Here goes nothing,"

It's a song Alana's never heard before but the world is spinning and it's a love song and Alana feels like it was written for her. Then suddenly, it's over, and Zoe is so _talented_. "That was amazing. Zoe, that was so good."

Zoe feels heat rising to her face. "Thanks." she shoots a sheepish smile.

"Absolutely no problem."

Zoe rubs her neck, nods; readjusts her hands on the guitar.

"What do you like?" Alana blurts.

"What?" Zoe's eyebrows furrow.

"You've always asked me what I like. What do you like?" she persists.

She takes a breath. "You," she whispers. "I like you."

Suddenly, Zoe's being kissed. Alana is there, kissing her, and there's no gap, no space, but then it's over and Alana is stumbling away, away, _away_ , and Zoe wants to just reach out and touch her, she wants to say _stop, wait, come back. I want you here._ but she's already gone, out of Zoe's room, and Zoe's stumbling to stop her but Alana's just so much faster and determined. By the time Zoe reaches the bottom of the stairs, she hears the door slam. 

"What did you do?" Connor and Larry say at the same time then glare at each other, like the other planned to steal their line.

Cynthia emerges from the kitchen, looks around, and says, sadly, confused, "But she didn't even stay for cookies?"

And Zoe stands there. Frozen.

-

Zoe spends the whole of Saturday locked in her room. She listens to the same song on repeat. She does nothing but lay in her bed and watch _Parks and Recreation_ and drift in and out of consciousness. She gets up at sometime to brush her teeth but she honestly has no idea how long it's been since then.

She gets up the courage to call Alana at a time that she thinks is probably the end of the day. Possibly seven. It's dark outside, at least. The phone rings, for a really long time, but eventually there's a click and a "Hello?"

"You picked up," Zoe says, a bit numbly, a bit surprised.

"I tried to ignore it, but. I couldn't. I can't ignore you," she says weakly, like it like it's something to be ashamed of.

"Can we talk?"

"Now? Zoe, it's ten at night."

Ah, so that's the time. Zoe was about three hours off.

"No, um. How about my house tomorrow at twelve? That's like the only day we can meet with privacy anytime soon. My dad will be at work, my mom will be at bookclub and Connor's hanging out with Evan for the first time in _forever_. He was starting to get extra grumpy and I was starting to get extra annoyed with him," she rambles a bit, because she was so worried she'd never be able to speak to Alana ever again and she just doesn't want this phone call to end.

"That works for me," Clipped. Calculated.

"Cool."

There's a click and she's gone.

If Zoe cries, that's no one's business but her own.

-

It's twelve-thirty, Sunday, and Alana is late. 

Zoe's pacing, trying to stir up some semblance of a brave face, but Alana is so diligent and never late. She's probably just not coming. Zoe shouldn't be surprised, but she is.

She puts a pot of water on the stove for tea and waits for it to heat up. She taps against her mug, checks her hair in the mirror, adjusts the table cloth. She checks the water again. It's done. She puts the teabag in and pours. She retrieves the sugar from the top shelf. She grabs a spoon from the silverware drawer. She stirs. She waits.

And waits. 

And waits.

She takes a sip. It's done. She removes the teabag, watches the clock. She drinks a bit more. Still no Alana.

At one o'clock, the doorbell rings, and Zoe is jolted out of her thoughts. Her tea is half empty and lukewarm at best at this point. She gets up, goes to the living room, and opens the door.

She's met face to face with Alana. She's shaking with bitten lips and covered in a big raincoat. Zoe steps aside to let her in.

Alana drips water on the carpet. Zoe closes the door and Alana removes her coat, but she keeps her hold on it. "Zoe, I--"

"Do you want some tea?" Zoe interrupts, already heading to the kitchen anyway. 

Alana trails behind her, trying to get her say in, "Actually, no---"

"Great," Zoe says, refilling her pot with water and putting it on the stove. 

Alana just sighs and takes a seat at the table, laying her coat on the chair next to her. She's still shivering, and Zoe wants to hug her or. Something. Zoe stands by and watches the water heat up little by little. She hears her mom say _a watched pot never boils_ in her mind. She keeps her eyes glued to it anyway.

Eventually, it's hot enough and she pours it into a mug that matches her own. She gives Alana the cup, the teabag and the sugar. Alana ignores the sugar altogether and reluctantly immerses the teabag in her water. Zoe sits across from her with her own cold mug wrapped in her hands. 

Zoe takes a sip idly, looks at Alana above the rim of her cup.

"Zoe," she finally gets a word in. She takes a deep breath, stands up from the stupid green chair. Zoe can tell every muscle in her body is sprung and prepared to run. "I don't think we can keep doing this."

"Why?" Zoe feels some sort of ache in her chest. She feels like her ribs have suddenly grown exhausted all of the sudden.

" _Why_? Zoe, I _kissed you_." Alana runs a hand through her hair, dislodging a bobby pin. For once, she does nothing to fix it. Instead, it remains clasped in her hand.

"And?" Zoe looks at the brown liquid in her cup blankly.

"I made a fatal mistake Zoe," she sounds like she can't possibly fathom how Zoe is blind to this.

"Oh." Zoe looks at Alana, but also not really. Her eyes are unfocusing in a weird way. 

"I'm sorry, but I just can't do this." she grabs her coat, slips it on. Zoe knows she's going to leave. She needs to keep her around. She looks for any excuse to try to get Alana to stop, to stay, a way to finally say _stop, wait, come back. I want you here_.

"I didn't need tutoring," Zoe blurts, panicked. It's not what she meant to say.

"You-- What?" her tone is offended and shocked. Zoe can't blame her.

"Nothing ever changes. You're different. You make me feel like I'm _somewhere_. Alana, I didn't do this just to leach off your intelligence, I just genuinely wanted-- _want_ you around," her voice breaks, and before she knows it her vision's gone blurry and she's fighting the tears off her face because she likes Alana more than she's ever liked anyone and Alana is the answer. Alana has always been the answer. "Please," she says, in this pathetic, broken, wet voice.

Alana has found a patch on the floor to focus her whole being on. Her walls are up, posture straight. Zoe thinks she might be crying. "I can't do this, Zo," she says, dangerously quiet, dangerously soft, in the most unsteady voice Zoe's ever heard her taken on, and then she's running out the door. Zoe immediately wants her back.

She stands on shaky legs– or maybe the grounds just wobbling? She can't tell. Everything's spinning. She puts a hand on the counter to stabilize herself.

The mug falls off the surface and shatters. The sob she'd been holding in for the past two minutes rips its way from her throat. Her knees can't support her weight anymore and before she even processes, she's fallen onto the ground and into the glass. Zoe sees red immediately, her hands have cuts from trying to save her from the fall and her knees fell straight into the shards.

It's not like it's that much of a big deal or anything but Zoe's always been scared of blood and it makes her do stupid things and she sort of wants to throw up because there is quite a bit of blood all over right now.

She calmly as possible reaches into her pocket, trying not to get blood on her phone (or anywhere, for that matter), and dials the last number she called without looking to see who it is because her stomach is lurching and she just can't be alone right now.

"What do you want, asshole?" 

Of course it's Connor. Of _course_. Just her luck.

"Listen, I-- I know you probably hate me since you haven't hung out with Evan in a while and I'm ruining it but I--" she wavers, "I need--" another anguished sound comes from her throat without invitation.

Connor is silent for too long, she almost thinks he's hung up, "Are you at home?"

She gives a watery 'mhm'.

"Fuck, okay, be there in ten," his voice is more urgent now.

"Thank you," she says, but he's already hung up. Her words hang in the air, unheard. 

-

A few moments later, she hears the door open and slam. Detachedly, she thinks about how Connor's approaching. She feels like she should prepare him, or warn him, but she doesn't know how so she just waits.

Connor enters the room and immediately flinches back, like there's a rope tied to his foot and it's snagged. "Oh my god, Zo," he says, looking at her in shock. Surprise hasn't felt like an upper hand at all, for a very long time, she realizes. "What happened?"

"I, um, fell asleep standing up?" she laughs forcedly. It sounds like an actual 'haha' noise. A poor imitation of a real laugh. She wipes the tears off her face.

Connor's eyebrows shoot up. He knows she's lying, she can tell, but he has the decency to not mention it. At least for now. "We should clean those cuts," he states. Zoe nods in agreement. Connor holds his hands out to her, "Here, let me help."

"No, I-- I can do this myself," Zoe insists, stubbornly, and she tries, but she's just catapulted back onto the glass. She lets out a cry of agony.

Connor swears under his breath. "Zoe, you can't get up on your own. You're going to have to trust me."

She sucks in air through her teeth painfully, "You're going to drop me."

"I won't," he promises, looking her in the eyes.

"But you could," Zoe tries to reason.

"Zoe, you're losing blood. Please just trust me," Connor pleads. He shakes his arms in a way that would be kind of funny if it wasn't for the situation.

"I can't," she admits. 

"You have to."

"You promise you'll be able to pull me up?" her voice wobbles a bit. 

"For fuck's sake Zoe, yes."

She grabs his hands, finally. He pulls her back up to safety.

"Damn," Zoe hisses.

"Hurts?" he asks, trying to steady her by pulling her arm around his shoulders.

"Like hell," Zoe confirms.

"Do you want to wait for a few seconds or just head to the bathroom now?" Connor questions.

"Let's just get it over with."

They try to walk as delicately as possible, like walking on the same eggshells Zoe has for years. Connor supports her all the way there. She grits her teeth, it's not that bad for a while. When they finally get in their bathroom, Connor leaves her side and she sits down on the toilet lid. He opens the medicine cabinet. She watches as he pulls out a first aid-kit and then neosporin and gauze. She raises an eyebrow.

"Shut up," he says, uncapping the neosporin.

"I didn't say anything," Zoe points out.

"You're thinking loud," Connor lets her know.

"Since when did you know anything about taking care of people or yourself medically?" It's a valid question.

"Evan's mom is a nurse," he says it like that sentence is good enough explanation. Zoe guesses it is. "Hand," he requests.

She holds it out for him, and he grabs it gently. She winces when he starts to apply the neosporin. "Ow."

"Sorry, should've warned you," he says distractedly.

They don't talk until Connor finishes applying the cold goo to all the cuts on her hands, knees, backs of calves, then the gauze comes. They still lapse into silence other than the occasional "sorry", "is that too tight?", "is that tight enough?". Connor's obviously new at this but it's amazing that he'd do this sort of thing for her. They don't do that usually- wrong word. They don't do that ever.

"I want to get this checked with someone who actually knows what they're doing." Connor bites him bottom lip unsurely.

"Who?" Zoe prompts.

Connor taps one of the shells on the wall, stares blankly at a patch of space behind Zoe (Cynthia had decorated the whole room in an "ocean theme", like most everyone else). "We could go to the hospital where Heidi works. She'd check for free."

Zoe blinks, "Heidi?"

"Oh." Connor's gaze shifts a little, "Evan's mom. The nurse."

"Ah," Zoe says. "Yeah, I guess we could. It's not that big of a deal though. I think you did fine."

"I just want to make sure." Connor runs a hand roughly through slightly matted hair. 

"Connor--"

"Please, Zoe." He looks concerned. It's an extremely unfamiliar sight.

"Okay," she gives in. Connor looks appeased by this. 

"Alright, I'm gonna go clean up the glass in the kitchen so Cynthia and Larry freak out less. Go to the car. I'll be out in five, I'll drive."

\- 

"Oh, hello Connor!" some lady at the desk says. 

"Hi, Cindy." he pushes a piece of hair out of his face, "Can you ask Heidi if we can see her on her lunch break?" 

The lady - Cindy, - frowns in this deep, prominent way. "An emergency patient came in a little bit ago, so she'll be quite a bit longer, but as soon as I can get ahold of her I'll let her know."

Connor nods, "Thanks."

"No problem, honey."

They take a seat in uncomfortable waiting room chairs and Zoe grabs a cooking magazine to loosely leaf through. "So," she says, eyes purposefully focused on the brownies in her magazine. "You're here a lot?"

"Not that much, just--" Connor stops. "No, not really," he doesn't elaborate. Zoe realizes they don't do this. They don't make conversation.

The atmosphere of the room becomes stiflingly awkward. Zoe stumbles upon a page full of gluten-free recipes. She quickly turns the page.

She makes it ten minutes before she puts down the magazine and says, plainly, "I'm bored."

"I brought cards?" Connor asks. It's not really a question.

"Really?" Zoe wants to ask _why? why would you just have cards?_ but they don't do this. Zoe's only started to recognize just how little she knows Connor. It feels like she's trying to catch smoke between her fingers. She knows what he is from the outside but she's worried if she gets to close she'll burn or cough. He passes right through her fingertips.

"Yeah." he shifts his feet, black wannabe emo combat boots and all, and uncomfortably clears his throat. They lapse back into quiet.

"Wanna play go fish?" Zoe doesn't know why she says it. She knows she wants to, but they don't do this. Ever. She wishes she should pluck the words from the air and shove them back into her mouth, but it's like grabbing smoke. It's impossible. She suddenly feels the urge to cough. 

"Prepare to go down," Connor says, an unrecognizable glint in his eyes. 

"Puh- _lease_." Zoe snickers, "You and I both know board games and things of a similar caliber are my expertise."

"Ah, you see, that's where you're wrong." Connor looks at her, fake pity on his face, "Go fish is not in the simple 'similar caliber' you blabber about. Go fish is my bitch."

"Let's just start," Zoe grows impatient.

"Fine. You asked for it."

Connor isn't lying, Zoe learns, half an hour later, in which she's been beaten two times.

"I give up!" she cries in a moment of outburst after his second win, flinging her cards into the air. "This is so unfair. You're obviously cheating."

"How _dare_ you say that. Betrayal from my own flesh and blood," he deadpans, hand splayed over his heart in mock-shock. He bends over to retrieve her cards, and begins to reshuffle them.

She shoves him lightly, "We are not related. Not after that, at least." There's a pause while she watches Connor shuffle. "This is kind of weird," she thinks aloud.

Connor nods in understanding, "Yeah." It's the distance thing. They've been so separated it's weird how they can connect so quickly. He deals her seven cards. "Do you have any nines?"

"Connor?" a voice interrupts. Their heads both whip in the direction of the sound in unison.

"Oh, Heidi!" Connor exclaims. "Zoe cut herself really bad, and I did my best to dress it, but I was wondering if you could inspect it just in case?" 

"This is Zoe?" she questions, a warm, tired smile pointed in Zoe's direction. Connor nods. Heidi extends her hand towards Zoe, "I've heard a lot about you, Zoe. It's nice to meet you." 

"Nice to meet you too, Heidi." Zoe takes her hand.

"I can check your injuries just real quick, but I do kind of have to do it in a rush, I apologize," she laments.

"That's fine," Zoe lets her know. Heidi grabs a chair and pulls it up to sit across from Zoe. She carefully undoes the gauze. 

She winces, "Yikes. You were really dealt a number, huh?" Heidi's eyebrows furrow a bit.

Zoe laughs, "Yeah, you could say that."

Heidi squints in a way that reminds Zoe of Evan. She looks at her leg for a while longer, then her hands, then she nods conclusively. She smiles at Zoe. "You should be okay as long as you continue to tend to it."

"Thank you, Heidi," Zoe gives her gratitude sincerely.

"It was absolutely no problem," Heidi brushes off the compliment with ease. She glances at the clock, "Shoot, I've gotta go." She stands up, drags the chair back to its original place. "Again, nice meeting you, Zoe! Have a nice day, kids!"

"You too, Heidi!" Connor yells back. They wait a few more seconds before talking, but it's not really awkward anymore. "We should probably leave," Connor mumbles reluctantly.

"Mom and dad will probably be home by now," Zoe observes, tapping a finger against her thigh, which kind of hurts but it's a mild inconvenience.

"I know," it comes out as an almost-sigh. 

They both get up and make their way to the car without another word spoken.

-

"So do you want to play Crazy 8's?" Connor asks, halfway through the door of their house.

"Absolutely not," Zoe answers, immediate.

"You're no fun." Connor bumps her shoulder. She bumps back harder. He's about to bump into her again when–

"Zoe?! You're bleeding!" There Cynthia stands, in the entryway from the kitchen. Connor and Zoe share a look. They knew this was coming.

"I'm really fine, mom--"

"What happened?" She doesn't take her eyes off Zoe's legs, not even once.

"I dropped a mug then I fell, that's all, it's really no big de--"

"What's going on?" Larry comes, a storm comes with him. Zoe wraps her arms around herself, suddenly feeling cold. He catches sight of Zoe's bandages and looks Connor directly in the face, "What did you do?" 

Zoe looks towards Connor. She can't read his face. He has his lips pulled tightly, eyes expressionless. 

"Larry, dear--" Cynthia tries to reason.

He turns to face Zoe instead, "Zoe, do you want us to ground Connor?"

"What? No, absolutely not. What?"

"He obviously had something to do with this, right? I mean, how else would you be this way?" Larry gestures, obviously confused. The whole thing is nonsensical.

"A freak kitchen accident. Dad, he literally did nothing but be there for me. He was a big help," Zoe tries to get through to him, but he won't listen. He's shaking his head vigorously.

"Zoe," it's a tone laced heavily with sympathy. "You can tell us. He can't hurt you anymore." He places a hand on her shoulder. 

She shrugs it off sharply, "Don't touch me." she glares. "Connor was nothing but helpful."

Cynthia looks like she wants the ground to swallow her up. She grabs Larry's arm delicately, "Honey, please."

"I'm not doing anything wrong, Cynthia!"

"Larry." she gives him a look that could kill. Both her and Connor inherited that skill from their mother.

He relents quickly, if not overly disgruntled.

"I'm, um, really tired so I'm. Gonna head upstairs." She coughs, "Now."

Cynthia replies, "Oh, Zoe, that's fine." She leaves to the kitchen, Larry following her out of the room. Zoe knows that they're going to start fighting as soon as she leaves. Connor sits there, fiddling with a frayed string on his jeans. 

"Thanks for sticking up for me," he mutters.

"What was that? I couldn't hear you." she grins.

"You know what I said, asshole." he looks embarrassed.

"Fine, fine." a pause, "I was telling the truth when I said I was tired. I'm gonna head upstairs."

Connor looks like something is resting on the tip of his tongue, like there is something he wants to tell her, but instead he just shrugs and says, "Okay."

Zoe retreats. She really doesn't want to go to school tomorrow, she realizes, halfway up the stairs. 

-

She gets up the next morning and begrudgingly brushes her teeth. She doesn't want to go to school but that doesn't mean she won't. She ties her hair up into a ponytail– she doesn't really want to look at the magenta right now.

When Zoe leaves the bathroom, she makes a beeline to Connor's room and pushes it open. "You have ten minutes to be in the car," she tells him, and then she's off, running down the stairs, and almost out the door until Cynthia says "angel, please come get something to at least take in the car with you." so she grabs a piece of toast. She's too sick to eat it now but she'll force herself to eat it in math class. The teacher lets them eat whatever if they complete their lesson.

Connor shows up with thirty seconds to spare. "Took you long enough," Zoe greets when he gets into the car. This is something they do actually do. 

He simply flips her off and leans his head against the window. Zoe may not know a lot about her brother, but she does know that he is not a morning person. Because of this, she blares her music extra loud and sings off-tune everyday on the way to school. 

She doesn't do that today. It serves as a silent ' _thank you_ ' for everything done yesterday. They exit the car in an almost-sync, but she knows that she's operating on eighth notes and Connor's operating on quarter notes. They walk inside together, close by, yet still apart.

"Good luck," Connor says when he breaks away to his locker.

"You too," Zoe calls, giving him a thumbs up over her shoulder. She doesn't stop. She can't. 

-

Zoe doesn't see Alana once by the time it's lunch, which is remarkably sad, considering how demanding Alana's presence is usually. She's seen a sea of hunched backs and people trying to make themselves as small as possible (because really, what is high school if not that?). She wonders if Alana's trying to blend in just to avoid her. Zoe's palms itch under the gauze frustratingly.

When she goes to their usual place in the library, Alana's not there. It's not like she was expecting her to be after the whole day being absent of her, but. That doesn't mean she doesn't wish things were different.

Alana left. Zoe didn't seem to realize how happy Alana was keeping her until she's paralyzed.

"Zoe?" someone says. She turns around to find Connor.

"Oh. Hi." She brings herself back to Earth as best she can.

"Listen, I know you don't want to talk about it– or at least, you don't want to talk about it to me, which is fine. Totally fine. But I know something's up." he takes a breath through his nose, "Wanna get out of here?"

"What?"

"Cut class, Zo," he explains bluntly.

"I've never done it before."

"No shit. You're the perfect one, remember? I know you haven't. It's time for you to,"

"I don't think it's really a good idea." Zoe peals off some flakes of wine color from her nails.

"C'mon, don't you want to experience that stupid cliché rebellious teen phase at least once before you graduate?" Connor persuades.

She's silent for a few moments, "Come to think of it, I don't really want to be at school like, at all, right now." Cutting class starts to sound a lot better when she thinks about Alana. Alana. "You know what? Fuck it, let's do this thing."

Connor cheers, the librarian sends him a glare. He sends her one back.

"Let's get out of here before the librarian kills me," he whispers. They leave the library, and Zoe's plunged into the pages of Skipping School for Dummies by Connor Murphy in real life. He shows her the best unused exit, talks about how the school doesn't really give a shit who's there and who's not anyway. He also tells her that if any teachers ask why she was absent the next day to tell them she was sick. He "does this all time, it's no big deal."

And then, he's opening the door, and Zoe steps through it and just like that she's out of the school. She's free. Nothing happens. No consequences or yelling. Connor strides passed her with ease.

The parking lot is probably the scariest part because it's so close to the office and if they aren't careful they'll get caught and Zoe's adrenaline levels immediately spike. Abruptly, somehow, they skyrocket off the charts. Connor doesn't seem to notice and just hastily heads towards the car. Zoe follows, a bit hesitantly, but she does it nonetheless. And she makes it, and she's so full of nerves, and she feels an immense sense of freedom. "This is amazing," Zoe says while Connor backs up the car, "You do this every day?"

"It's not amazing for someone who doesn't really care." Connor shrugs, "Also, not too much at the moment. I'm making some sort of effort."

Zoe's eyebrows shoot up. "Really?" She can't help the surprise that seeps into her voice. "Change of heart or something?"

Connor just grunts in response and switches on his music. 'Emo and oldie shit', Zoe likes to call it.

"So," Connor starts, never a good thing to start with for him, "What really happened?" He turns down the sound of _The Chain_ a bit.

Zoe lifts her face from the window and shrugs. Then, she realizes that Connor's eyes are (thankfully) on the road and realizes she has to give him an actual answer. "Um, I invited Alana over."

"She wasn't there when I came to help," There's a question in Connor's voice. Zoe has the epiphany that no one knows about what happened on Friday night except her and Alana. She wonders if she really wants to let Connor in on the story.

She sighs, makes a choice. "You know how she rushed out on Friday?"

"Yeah." Connor nods certainly.

"She kissed me," she says it with an air nonchalance. Like it doesn't matter. It shouldn't. It didn't to Alana, anyway.

Connor, ever bad driver, swerves, "What?"

"Yeah," Zoe gulps.

"What happened after? Why did she rush out?"

"She just.. apologized and left. I couldn't catch up to her." Zoe picks off the last flake of nail polish on her hands, "I called her and asked her to come over the next day. She said she couldn't be around me anymore and that the whole thing was a 'fatal mistake'." Connor is silent. "Then I started crying, and my hands shook really badly and- well, here we are."

"Wow, that's." Connor stops, "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. Thanks for coming when I called."

"I'm not that much of an asshole." The next song starts, "It's no problem, though," The whole car ride is sort of awkward, but they're trying and that's what counts. They're trying.

About twenty minutes pass in which Zoe hears enough of _The Smiths_ for an entire lifetime before they pull up into an eerily familiar parking lot. "Oh my god, you didn't."

"I did." Connor smirks, opens his door and heads into the shop. Zoe smiles at the red neon pink against the white and blue exterior. She follows him inside, it feels straight from a memory. It smells like summer inside.

She joins him at the counter, "I can't believe we're back here."

"Yeah, well. I missed it," The words hold an inexplicable weight to them.

"Hello! Welcome to A La Mode, how may I help you?" The person at the counter asks.

Connor orders pumpkin spice, Zoe orders vanilla bean. Zoe calls him a basic bitch, Connor flips her off and informs her that vanilla is as basic as she can get. Their ice cream is out in five minutes and Connor pays for it.

Zoe sits down on one of the tables with stools around it but Connor tells her they're not staying so they get back in the car and Zoe threatens to snap his CD in half because she will not listen to one more song of _The Smiths_. He puts in _From Under the Cork Tree_ instead. Zoe is contented for now.

"Where are we headed to now?" she asks, holding both Connor's ice cream and her own. It's exceedingly hard to drive with ice cream in your hands, so she had decided to take pity on her brother.

"Another nostalgic one. I've been wanting to drive there for a while now. Never could find the time, though." he turns to the right.

"This drive does look familiar." Zoe notes.

"I would hope so, you should remember this place as much as I do. It'd be fucking unfair if you don't."

Connor pulls the car to a stop adjacent to the sidewalk. He and Zoe exit the car.

When she looks around, she's filled with a mild disbelief. "Is this–"

"Yes," Connor interrupts.

"I haven't been back here in forever," she says, already trailing through the long unkempt grass. It feels like her fingers are skimming an old book, the words are the same but she's older and wiser and knows what's coming next so they've suddenly taken on a whole new, deeper meaning.

"Me neither. I never wanted to but, I don't know, I guess I felt oddly sentimental." Connor scuffs a boot against the sidewalk. He's holding back. Zoe's already to the oak tree.

"I've missed it," she admits, brushing her fingers along the tree. "Did you ever used to climb this at recess?"

"Nah. I would only hang out on the tire swing." Connor enters the grass. 

"Well, that's unfortunate," Zoe says, following the rope down to where it seems to have snapped. She picks up the tire and displays it in Connor's direction.

"Damn." he snaps his fingers, sarcastically. Zoe rolls her eyes and drops the tire. She reaches her hands upwards and hooks onto a low hanging branch. She swings herself up. She does it again with the next branch, and the next. It feels like retracing her steps for something she's lost along the way. She's surprised when somewhere along the line she looks down and Connor's only one branch behind her.

"I thought you said you've never climbed this tree." She blinks down at him.

"I haven't," he says, toneless.

"You're weird."

"Whatever." he climbs down to the next branch, "I'm heading down,"

"I'll come too."

"Okay."

When they reach the ground, Zoe lets her eyes rest on the battered swing set. "Do you think those are safe to sit on?"

"Only one way to find out, I guess." Connor stalks towards them. He sits down and winces at the creaking sound, but backs up and releases despite it. He gives a thumbs up indifferently in Zoe's direction, midair.

"You must have a death wish," She doesn't remember that Connor does, in fact, have a death wish until after the words leave her mouth. He hasn't stopped swinging though. "Sorry," she says. It doesn't feel like she's in a playground. It feels like it's May of sophomore year and she's knocking on Connor's door yelling about him having her "fucking calculus notebook. I don't know why you'd take it, but I can't find it, so give it back, asshole." and he isn't answering and suddenly Larry's by her side, pounding on the door but he still won't answer. Zoe knows the car's at home. She knows he's in there and–

"It's okay." Connor meets her eyes for just a moment. Zoe tries to stop thinking about him and the rope and the chair or him in a park on a bench and missing pills, or anything else. She takes her seat on the swing next to him. 

"How are things with Evan?" she places her hands on the chains.

"You called me the other day when I was in the middle of apologizing to him." Connor kicks off again. "I thought about what you said a while ago and um, it pushed me to talk to him. Thanks."

"Yeah, of course," she says, rolling the fabric of her sweater between her fingers. Quiet laps over them like waves. Connor kicks up again, and life starts again in an abandoned elementary school playground.

-

"I'm sorry again about Alana," Connor tells her, at 3:30, on their way back to the car. "It sounds like it really fucking sucks."

"Yeah, it does. It's not like I can do anything about it though." Zoe wraps her arms around herself. "She doesn't want m-- to be around me. I can't force her. I wouldn't."

They get in the car and head home without another word. Connor doesn't play any music. When they pull up to the house, Zoe says thank you. Connor nods. They separate to go to their rooms.

Zoe feels a bit weird alone in her room after the passed few days. There's just been so much noise and now it's just her and her room. 

-

She sees Alana multiple times the next day, but she doesn't approach her. It feels like it would be a breach of her privacy. Alana wants to be left alone. Zoe should respect that. She's trying to.

It's hard not to run into someone who was a huge staple in your life. It's hard when she heads into English and gets handed a paper with a note that has ' _more active voice_!' scribbled onto it in red, felt marker and Zoe immediately thinks that tutoring didn't do her much good. She feels bad about it for the rest of class.

Zoe Murphy is left with nothing but passive voice, a barrage of faded lies, and crumpled pieces of paper of song lyrics that remind her of Alana. She guesses if nothing else, she'll never lie about needing a tutor again. She wants to laugh. It's not funny.

Alana is nonstop. She goes and goes and goes and she used to wait for Zoe to keep up, for whatever reason, but she's stopped waiting and Zoe can't catch up. She can't catch up in classes or hallways or an overgrown orchard. It doesn't matter where, really. Alana is out of reach.

She makes it through the day somehow. She eats in the library, still expecting to find a pair of beautiful eyes but there's nothing there. She goes to all her classes, finds Monika's giggling in business grating, barely coasts through math, smiles at Evan when he talks about trees - tells him that at one point, centuries ago, tulips used to be more valuable than gold in Holland. Life goes on. It makes Zoe's stomach lurch and it feels weird, but it goes on. 

She misses her.

Jazz Band is a disaster. She can't seem to find her focus and her fingers just aren't working and her guitar is slightly out of tune and nothing will go right. Emily, a bassist, says to "get your head in the game, Murphy." Her head is very much not in the game. She continues to trip up innumerably more times.

When she gets home, Connor is in her bedroom on the spinny chair, _The Office_ set up and ready to play on her TV. She climbs up to her bed, lets her feet dangle off the edge. Connor silently presses play. It's exactly what she needs.

They have such a fun time watching it that day it becomes an unspoken routine for the following days. Zoe's life is surprisingly steady. Less fights with Connor makes things better. She's not used to Alana's absence but it's becoming familiar. She still feels an ache in her chest constantly but she tries (and fails) not to think about it. 

Time's normal in the way that it's a circle. The Murphys' house goes back to being frozen, but Zoe's room is a bit warmer from breathless laughter. It feels like her life is a wine glass and someone is running their finger around the rim and making a sound to fill the air. Circles and circles and circles. It hurts her ears, but it's not as unpleasant as it could be.

One day, she decides impulsively on the way home to pick up some flowers. She asks the boy behind the counter if they have anything representing happiness. He grins, packages her some peonies, and charges her three dollars. She thanks him insistently for the low price and he just shrugs it off. 

Zoe, less scattered at Jazz Band but still not as good as usual, comes in early the next morning to practice guitar. She stumbles a bit, and it's insanely frustrating, but she's getting back on her feet just a bit, even when it feels like the rug is still being pulled out from under her. 

"Play your old solo," Ms. Poulain almost-demands after she finishes practicing her pieces she has with the whole band. It takes her by surprise. She pulls out the sheet music for it from the very back of her music folder.

Ms. Poulain's gaze is set on her while she plays, nerve wrackingly, so she stammers and contends with actually putting emotion into it. But then, Ms. Poulain taps her hands a quarter of the way through and tells her to restart from the beginning, but this time not think about it. There's no pressure.  

So she tries her best to picture herself somewhere away from prying eyes. She gets lost in the sound a bit of the way through. When she's done, she quickly mutes the sound of the resounding last note because she can't seem to bear the thought of something left hanging there, like an unanswered question.

Ms. Poulain has her usual all-knowing smile when Zoe looks up, but her eyes look sadder. "Is she gone?"

Zoe isn't sure if Ms. Poulain's referring what she thinks she is, but she nods nonetheless.

Ms. Poulain nods back. "I could tell. Your solo is just as great it's just.. different. It's more of a haunting, lingering, sad sort of sound now. It's not bad. Just different."

Zoe drives to the flower shop on her lunch break and buys a bouquet of purple hyacinths ( _please forgive me_ ). The plan was to get them to Alana somehow, but all the motivation leaves her the moment she steps into school. Still, it feels like a waste to throw away perfectly good flowers, so she gives the to Connor instead. He likes them, surprisingly. He wears one in his hair for the remainder of the day. When Zoe sees a purple flower tucked behind Evan's ear later that day, she just smiles to herself and says nothing.

One day after school, she tries to play a few notes on the piano, but she's pretty rubbish at it. It's been so long since the piano's been used that it's probably terribly out of tune and it's covered in dust, but it's been even longer since she's played. She can barely even play with two hands anymore. She tries to play Fur Elise but it goes catastrophically wrong.

When she hears Connor enter the piano room, she scoots over on the piano bench. He sits down lightly, a bit on guard. 

He clears his throat, "Do you remember how to play heart and soul?" and Zoe nods, because who _doesn't_ know how to play heart and soul? It's the easiest, most generic piano duet out there. "I'll take lower."

Zoe's lucky she's a music person or else she's pretty sure their duet would've ended in disaster from bad timing. They flub up a bit, and it's not very good, but it's not terrible either and it makes Zoe feel like she's a child again. She can't help but giggle after they finish.

Connor's smiling too, just a small upturn of his lips. "Hey, let's do another one," he suggests.

"I don't remember anything else," Zoe admits.

"I know a really simple one. The top part only has two keys," Connor says, "Here, I'll show you." He places his hand on a black key and a white key, switching back and forth between them as a demonstration. "See? Simple."

She mimics his movements from before, and he joins in with a more complicated bottom part. He eventually begins to put weight on the pedal, adding additional dynamics. 

When they've gone through it three times, they create a makeshift ending, and when the final note fades, Zoe asks, "What was that?"

"It's from a video game. You'd probably really like it, honestly, with your weird space thing." Connor shrugs. She punches him.

"Do you want to watch more of _The Office_?" she asks.

"Yeah," Connor says. A contemplative look takes over his face for a few seconds. "It's Friday."

"Yes, it is," Zoe confirms, not quite following.

"We should watch at least until Jim and Pam get together," Connor suggests.

"Oh my god, yes. It annoys me so much to watch them struggle with something so obvious."

Connor looks at her for a few seconds, face unreadable. "Yeah, I know what you mean."

The silence takes over for a bit, before Connor speaks up again, "I'll make popcorn?"

Zoe nods, "Sounds good."

They abandon the piano bench, and Zoe heads up to her room to get everything ready when an idea strikes her. It's the kind of idea that scares her, because she's really not sure if she should go through with it when things are still so fragile with her brother. She chews her lip, and at some point thinks _screw it_.

She sets up a blanket fort. She's pretty rusty after so many years of lying dormant, but she doesn't think it's too bad. In fact, maybe it's even sorta-good.

It starts as just the blanket fort, she swears to herself. But then suddenly, she's pulling out the nailpolishes because she's bad at finding out when to stop.

Connor returns with the popcorn. When he looks at the fort, Zoe sees an expression on his face that she hasn't since she was eight and a half. An episode later, Connor cracks open the nail polish box, requesting black as dark as the void. Zoe paints them navy because she will never fully comply to Connor's wishes, even if they are on better terms. Connor doesn't notice, but she knows he will tomorrow when he's less distracted. The whole artistic eye or whatever.

Later, when they finally get to The Episode, and Pam asks "I'm sorry, what was the question?" Connor finds himself on the bottom bunk. When they shut off the TV, they make up some new constellations. Different, but the same. Zoe thinks global warming is starting to affect her room. The house is still frozen, but maybe she's not.

-

It happens after school on Monday, raining, during an individual extra practice. Ms. Poulain mentions how the oboe (The Worst Instrument, but, that's just Zoe's opinion.) reminds her of the ocean. And suddenly, Zoe knows exactly what she's doing again. She's thrown, abruptly, back into active voice. She scrambles out of the music room, spewing apologies, leaving a trail of hope in her wake.

-

The amaryllis flower is named after a greek myth. Zoe learns this when she rents a language of flowers book from the library.

Amaryllis was a nymph who fell in love with a shepherd named Alteo, according to her book. This love was unrequited, but Amaryllis wanted him to love her back so _badly_ , she asked advice from the oracle Delphi. She knew the thing Alteo desired most was a flower so rare that it didn't even exist yet (for whatever reason. Zoe isn't quite sure. Myths are weird.).

Amaryllis followed the instructions she was given by Delphi. She dressed in maiden white and waited on Alteo's doorstep for 30 nights in a row and pierced her heart each night with a golden arrow. When Alteo finally opened his door one night, there was no longer Amaryllis, but a crimson flower from the blood of her heart in her place.

It confuses Zoe, but. Whatever. That's love, apparently.

It's a cheesy choice to go with, but she asks for them anyway. She asks for amaryllis and hyacinths and irises. The boy behind the counter hands them over.

She takes them to school the next day. Attaches a note to them and shoves them into Alana's locker. Doesn't look back.

She doesn't leave a signature on her note, so she wears a flower crown that day and hopes it's hint enough. She makes Connor wear one too, her only black one. He wouldn't abide to her wishes otherwise.

_Meet me after school at 2:30 in the parking lot by my car._

-

Alana looks startled to see Connor there, leaning against Zoe's car with his hands in his pockets. She asks, immediately, "Am I in the right place?"

"'Fraid so." Connor nods. 

"I thought–" she stops herself, "The note was written in Zoe's handwriting, though?"

"Yeah," Connor doesn't elaborate.

There's a heavy silence. "I don't understand," Alana conveys.

"Wanna take a road trip?" Connor suggests, explaining nothing. In fact, it makes everything more perplexing.

"Are you serious?" Alana asks, eyebrows raised.

"Yeah, why not? Text your parents and let them know you won't be home until the end of the night." He shrugs and enters the car in the driver's seat. Alana simply stares at him. He rolls down the window, "You coming?"

And Alana, inexplicably, nods, and says, "Yeah." She walks around the car to the passenger's side, and slides into the seat, seatbelt on and hands folded in her lap in a polite manner. Connor cranks up the volume of _Carry On My Wayward Son_ and then they're pulling out of the parking spot and speeding off.

-

Four hours later, Zoe Murphy has been waiting on a beach in Massachusetts containing a bouquet of new england asters, red carnations and small sprinklings of baby's breath for half an hour. She's overly twitchy because she's antsy because Alana Beck is about to be there and she _likes_ Alana but she's also very scared of Alana. Actually, not scared of Alana, she's scared of _confronting_ Alana which isn't any better. She's stressed but also, whenever she takes a deep breath and the distinctness of saltwater air fills her lungs she goes slack. Her shoulders slump and she suddenly feels relaxed. It's phenomenally helpful but still only short-term helpful.

It's not the most beautiful day ever. The sky is gray and fully overcast with clouds. It's the type of cold that's not really uncomfortable, but still has Zoe shrinking into her sweatshirt for warmth, sleeves pulled up as a barrier of protection around her hands. The sea is a sort of ominous force, tossing and turning restlessly, just as anxious as she is.

When her own car pulls up next to Cynthia's (the one that Cynthia had let her take, barely any questions asked, other than safety concerned ones), she doesn't feel ready. That's an incredible under-exaggeration. She's extremely not ready.

She feels even less ready - she didn't think that was possible, - when the passenger door opens and she watches as Alana walks around to the front of the car. She sees the moment when Alana freezes from meeting Zoe's eyes, and feels her own tensity double. Connor unrolls his window just to shout, "Alright, well. I spotted a Taco Bell three blocks away so I'm going to get something to eat. You two have an hour to figure your shit out." 

Connor's driving away as quickly as he came, Alana's eyes trailing after him with this desperate expression that Zoe isn't familiar with.

Neither of them move for a few seconds.

"Hi," Zoe says. 

She's met with silence on Alana's part.

She sighs. She stands up, which causes Alana to startle. She continues upon her anyway. Alana backs up a bit when she comes too near. Zoe just sticks out her hand, the one filled with flowers and waits for Alana to take them. It takes a minute or two of just standing, but eventually she does reach out to retrieve the flowers. Zoe's arm falls back to her side.

"Why did you leave?" Zoe breaks the silence, hands stuffed deep in her pockets. She thinks she feels a raindrop for a second, but it's gone without a trace, so maybe she's imagining things.

Alana makes a betrayed noise. "Zoe, you and I both know the answer to that." She looks at her with eyes full of emotion. Zoe can't seem to pick out the exact ones.

"Because you kissed me?"

"Not exactly, that had to do with it." She won't meet her eyes. The trees around them shake as the wind picks up.

"Tell me what else then," Zoe requests. 

"Because our friendship wasn't meant to happen in the first place!" Alana's voice raises, "Hell, you didn't even need tutoring! You strung me along the whole time, _lying_ about everything. It was manipulative, and deceiving, and foolish. I'm deeply hurt by it," her voice lowers down again, like the calming of a storm. Crescendoing and diminuendoing in time.

"I didn't mean to do any of it," Zoe pleads with her, "It wasn't something I did purposefully, and I _know_ that's no excuse, but I just wanted a friend, Alana. I just wanted _you_." They're both breathing heavily. It starts fully drizzling. "I just want you." she repeats. 

The two of them are quiet again, but the gap of noise is filled by the whooshing of the light rain. Zoe walks a little further toward the ocean, silently. Her converse sink into the wet sand as she walks. 

Alana, surprisingly, follows behind.

Zoe unties her shoelaces, slips her shoes and socks off one at a time, and then rolls up her jeans. She walks into the ocean, just until the water pools around her ankles. "I know a thousand apologies can't fix what's happened but," she glances over her shoulder. She points to the bouquet Alana has set down, points to the asters specifically, "I wish things were different. Does that count for something?"

"Of course it does," Alana says, as soft as the rain.

"I miss you." Zoe chuckles, sort of heartlessly, "I'm also pretty in love with you so. That's a thing now." She brings up a hand to wipe her face. She's suddenly appreciative that she didn't have time to put on any makeup that morning.

Alana, still not in the ocean, on the beach, takes in a sharp breath. The elastic that she keeps wound tight around her wrist makes a loud, mezzoforte _thwap_ sound from behind Zoe. "Zoe." Alana says. It's a warning. Staccato-like curt. 

She can feel her bottom lip quivering pitifully. She doesn't turn around because she doesn't want her _weakness_ to be seen. "I just–" her voice becomes garbled, just a bit, that almost-crying tone starts seeping in. "Do you love me back?" It's extremely quiet, barely even there. The wind carries it away. Zoe can't catch smoke.

"What?"

"I get three last questions," her voice becomes swells. "Do you love me?"

"I– I told you I did, the night of the concert. You remember, right?" 

"No, I mean," Zoe pauses. She laughs a little, humorlessly, at the unlikeliness of this whole situation she's gotten herself into. She's standing here in the ocean three hours away from her home,  talking to the tutor she didn't need in the first about how she loves her. "Do you _love_ me back? The way I love you," her voice breaks on the last 'love'. Second question. Zoe can't tell if she's crying or if it's just the rain hitting her face. 

Alana stays quiet. "I do," soft, light, barely even there, _pianissimo_. Yet the two words have Zoe there, somewhere. A place where she doesn't have to feel unknown. She turns around a little, to face Alana. 

"Here we are, then." Zoe pulls her sleeves even further down. "What a mess."

Alana nods, looking out at the ocean, looking somewhere behind Zoe, "Here we are."

"Where do we go from here?" It's her last question. The third question. 

"Can I kiss you?" Alana blurts. Zoe feels her face change in shock. 

"Really?"

Alana bites her lip contemplatively. Then she nods. Slowly at first, then faster. "Yeah, really." An uncertain smile covers her face.

"Yes." The word leaves her mouth quickly. Zoe takes her hands in her own, shakily. Alana leans in. Her lips are _so soft_ , and this is so much better than 8th grade spin the bottle (the same party when Zoe realized _hey, you know, I wouldn't really mind kissing anyone here. Including the girls. Huh._ ). 

It's such a cliché- kissing in the rain. The rain makes their eyelashes wet and Zoe shivers from the cold but Alana keeps her warm. Alana's glasses stab her in the face at one point, causing her to let out this tiny 'ow', and they both start giggling so hard that they break apart. It's not even that funny.

Zoe squeezes her hand, rests her own forehead on Alana's and just stares. "I'm sorry," she whispers.

"It's okay. I blew it a little out of proportion–"

"No, you didn't. It was shitty," Zoe argues.

"Yeah, but, I think I was just worried it meant you felt forced to spend time with me and this whole ordeal was terrible," she pauses. Zoe takes the pause as an opportunity to take that in. It surprises her, because Alana _exudes_ confidence. "I guess that's something I'm really insecure about. Like, being an annoyance. Too much," she breathes it quietly, like it's a secret. It is, actually. 

"You don't have to be afraid of that with me. You are never an annoyance, never a problem," she rubs Alana's hands with her thumbs. "I'm having sort of a hard time believing this is real." Zoe admits, smile filling her face.

"Me too," Alana agrees.

"You don't know how long I've been waiting for this." ( _for you_ ) lies there, between the lines.

A smile overtakes her expression. "Again, me too." Zoe scans her face. "I can't see anything," Alana admits, stepping back a bit to remove her rain covered glasses and wipe them clean against her burgundy cardigan. Zoe spares a glance the bouquet laying on a rock a little bit away. 

"Your eyes are so pretty," Zoe tells her, because she _can_ now. Alana is blooming. Zoe is glowing. 

Zoe finally convinces Alana to take her shoes off and come in the water. They both can't seem to stop smiling. They talk like they used to, and things are okay.

The rain starts coming down harder, because the world isn't perfect. They have to take shelter under some trees a few meters away. Still, Zoe, shuddering and freezing, Alana's hand in her own, is smiling like she's never hated the rain in her life. Nothing is fixed, but it's okay. They'll get there.

"Hey! I understand you two are busy being gay or whatever, but we kind of promised Alana's parents we'd have her home by tonight," Connor shouts when he pulls back up. They thank him (or, at least, Alana thanks him. Zoe just calls him an asshole.) and then run to Cynthia car together, Alana's jacket lifted over their heads as a make-shift umbrella. 

She grabs the bouquet before leaving and hands it to Alana when they make it to the car. She also hands her a CD to put in the player, and request that she skip track twelve.

The sky above rumbles with thunder as the car pulls away from the beach.

Zoe's heart rumbles back.

**Author's Note:**

> 29,000 words and 3 months later, this fic is finally finished! it was literally supposed to be about 4k at the most, nothing but a vent fic, yet here we are because i have exactly zero (0) self control 
> 
> some things:   
> -the title of this fic is from [this song](https://youtu.be/VZ3iCIcPcgY)  
> -i was going to put some links here, but i couldn't find any good ones, so please look up some photos of jupiter!!! it's my fav planet and i lov!!!  
> -i tried to follow alana's actual music taste, that can be found [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/dearevanhansenofficial/playlist/7sTR5X4bdDnXM0G9jBCSfk?si=lkB2Z7BtRkuBw2hEIeIW5g)  
> -zoe's is Not actual, in fact, it's basically formed after my own odd musical heart. (oh wonder, jukebox the ghost, lany, lorde, dodie, the 1975, etc. stuff of that caliber.)  
> -[here](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFaBZWXqDcrSwVmcuMB8qSUp1MldJ8fDm) is a playlist of songs that remind me of this fic   
> -i firmly believe zoe and alana's first date was at an aquarium or observatory   
> -the duet connor and zoe played a bit of is [here](https://youtu.be/9QfPDmzpC2Q) from the game to the moon which i strongly recommend  
> -half moon beach is a real place!!!! i've never actually been there but it's. really pretty. it's in gloucester massachusetts.  
> -speaking of which, this fic takes place in new york state. i know deh canonically takes place in texas but i only found out about that after it was too late to change everything so.   
> -connor and ev have a whole separate thing going on during the entirety of this fic that i want to go into but i might actually write a separate fic about it one day so i won't   
> -go check out my friend [ayushi's account](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ayushi_writes)! she's a much better writer than i am and she helped so much with moral support throughout this fic (and she helps me with moral support in general literally all the time). i love her a lot and she deserves appreciation
> 
> so that's all! thanks for reading. this fic has a Lot of flaws and i know that but regardless, i put a lot of work into it and i'm going to let myself be proud of it.
> 
> my twitter can be found [here](https://twitter.com/ceciiysmith) if you wanna yell at me! <3


End file.
